Fanfiction» Fanfics» Shadow Forever

--LonLon Farmlands; location unknown--

"Noctus! Noctus, come down for dinner!"

The call that had just been made fell on deaf ears, as the black-and-red-furred hedgehog known as Noctus was too busy staring at the silvery gem he held in his hand. The same silvery gem he had had for as long as he could remember.

"Let's go over this again," Noctus muttered to himself. He narrowed his red-fur-rimmed eyes in concentration, his gaze still locked on the gem. "I have no name and no age. I have no history and no memories. For all I know, I could have fallen from outer space...well, whatever my past is, it's got something to do with this crystal I had with me when I first woke up. And sometimes, when I focus really hard on the crystal, I can move so fast that time itself seems slowed down. I feel like there's some kind of energy in this crystal, an energy I can unlock and use for my own; but what is it? And how does it all connect? It doesn't make sense!!"

"Noctus, did you hear me?" quite suddenly, a brown-haired human woman wearing worn denim overalls and a stained and dirty, white shirt burst into Noctus' room. "Ahh, Noctus, don't tell me you were staring at that jewel of yours again..."

"Sorry, mom," Noctus said sheepishly. "I just have a lot on my mind lately."

"I can tell, this is the fourth straight night in a row I've had to come up here to get you to come to dinner." Noctus' 'mom' winked. "Now, come on, we're having your favorite."

"Oh, cool!" Noctus said, grinning. He haplessly left the mysterious gem on his bed, and followed his mother out of the door. "After dinner, do I have to clean the stables?"

"Naw, you did it last night."

"I'd like to do it again tonight, and exchange nights with Jerry if you don't mind..." Noctus' voice disappeared down the stairs, enveloped by the sound of chattering from below. And in the hedgehog's absence, the stone began to glow...

* * *

--Two weeks later; east Pacific ocean--

"Tails, this is the fifth day we've been down here...are you sure the Chaos Emerald is around here?" Sonic couldn't help but sigh with the most absolute boredom. Being cramped up in a tiny space and reading monitors for hours wasn't exactly his idea of an adventure.

"I picked the signal up twice yesterday, and once the day before, all in about the same general area....but every time I get close, it starts to move in a different direction, like it's being controlled or something."

"Brings a whole new definition to the term 'Chaos Control,' don't you think?" Sonic suggested in monotone.

Tails paused suddenly. Both were inside the modified Tornado V, which now possessed a submersible mode, as well as an aircraft, a mech, and a go-kart, amongst other things. The Tornado V's main and copilot cockpits had been covered in domes made of a clear, glass-like material; Sonic forgot the real name of the stuff, since Tails had brought it up while he was in techno-babble mode, but whatever it was, it was supposed to be able to hold back up to 1000 times more pressure than the most high-tech military subs. Tails was seated in the main cockpit, controlling the movements and, should the need arise, the weapons of the Tornado V, while Sonic controlled the devices used to track down the specific energy waves of the Chaos Emerald.

"Chaos Control..." Tails murmured under his breath.

"You got something, kid?"

"I'm not quite sure...the idea I'm getting is sketchy at best, but I think I know of a way to catch up to that Chaos Emerald when it starts moving..."

"Really, now?"

"Yeah, but that means we'll need to dock now, and I need to make some more modifications to the Tornado V...more specifically, the co-pilot's cockpit."

"How come I don't like the direction this is gonna be going in?" Sonic sighed miserably, and slouched back in his seat.

* * *

--Angel Island--

"Here I come, rougher than the rest of them, the best of them, tougher than leather! You can call me--hey, Knuxter, what's the big idea??" Vector made a wild grab for his headphones, which Knuckles had pulled away to grab the crazy croc's attention.

"Look, you can rap all you want after we get finished with business here." Knuckles stared stonily at Vector. Vector grumbled something under his breath, but nodded anyway, rolling his eyes and holding out his hand. Knuckles laid the 'phones in Vector's awaiting palm, and turned back to Rouge, who had an amused look on her face. "So, where were we before we were so rudely interrupted, Ms. Lawyer?"

"As I was saying," Rouge said, her amused grin not fading in the slightest, "GUN is ruthless when it comes to getting what they want, so that means you'll have to do everything you can to make sure they don't get the Master Emerald. This probably means going mobile."

"Damn, does that mean we have to crash the Island again?" Mighty asked, the flickering light of the bonfire in the center of the arranged group playing across his black fur and yellow skin.

"I hate it when that happens; I usually wind up landing on my butt when the fall is over."

"You're so used to it by now, you should be able to get over it without a hitch," Espio pointed out with the kind of humor that was so cool it seemed serious that only the chameleon was capable of accomplishing smoothly.

"Guys, we need to stop bickering," Charmy pointed out. "With the entire Island and the Master Emerald at stake, the last thing we need to worry about are the bumps and bruises we'll suffer on the drop."

"The key factor here," Rouge continued loudly, interrupting and ignoring the other members of the Chaotix, "is timing. We need to remove the Master Emerald from the Chaos Shrine at the exact right time, since we're depending on two factors here; one, the Island's position over the planet below, and two, when GUN plans to strike. If we take the Emerald out too early, then GUN will be onto us; too late, and, well, we might lose the Master Emerald entirely."

"This is where we come in," Knuckles said. "We need to penetrate GUN's mission archives, weapons facility, and headquarters, to dig up as much information as we can about how they're going to get at us, when and with what weapons and strategies. I know sneaking around isn't our usual gig--for most of us, anyway--but this time, we gotta fight with our heads, not our fists."

"What's that old cliché? Desperate times call for desperate measures." Knuckles gave Espio a roguish grin. He turned his attention back to the group as a whole again, and said, "All right, so you all know the plans; any of you wanna back out now, while you still can?"

"Hell no," Vector said, flashing a toothy grin. "Man, what kind of team would we be if some of our members pansied out?"

"Agreed," Charmy, Mighty and Espio said simultaneously.

"All right, this is good, then." Rouge said, nodding. "Sorry, boys, but I won't be able to go with you; Somebody needs to keep an eye and a hand on the legal side of things, plus, my reputation could be at stake should I get caught; unlike you guys, I kinda need a bed to sleep in at night."

"Got'cha," Knuckles said, nodding. "We're gonna be heading out first thing tomorrow morning, boys. Meet me here at dawn."

"See ya later, Knuxie," Vector said, winking. He and the other four Chaotix stood up, and walked away from the Chaos Shrine, leaving Rouge and Knuckles alone.

"Ahh, so we're together at last," Rouge said, and somewhat seductively at that. "Now that we've got the boring part of it over with, shall we continue on our date?"

"Err." Knuckles muttered, blushing profusely.

"Aww, come on, don't be shy, now," Rouge prompted, standing up and walking over to Knuckles, sitting down next to him on the log he was sitting on, in the spot Vector had previously been occupying. She traced a light pattern on Knuckles' buff, furry chest with an elegant finger, causing the echidna guardian to blush even more. Rouge noticed this, and giggle, giving him a slow, light kiss on the cheek.

"It's been five long years, and it seems that I've finally got you where I want you at last," Rouge whispered into Knuckles' ear.

"Y-you know," Knuckles stuttered nervously, acting completely out of character, "I-I-I'm kinda new at this...dating, kissing, hugging...thing..."

"Don't worry about it," Rouge said, grinning with mild amusement. "Just let your body take over for your brain." With that, Rouge wrapped her arms around Knuckles' shoulders, and kissed him passionately and lovingly on the lips. Knuckles was unsure of himself at first, shocked at Rouge's proximity--but at last, he got into the rhythm of it, wrapping his arms around Rouge's waist, and returning the kiss...

* * *

--The next day, in the ocean again--

"Okay, so, lemme get this straight." Sonic's tone of voice betrayed the fact that he was incredibly bored. "You installed this Chaos Emerald drive in front of me. I'm supposed to touch the Chaos Emerald, then use the Chaos Control...then what?"

"Then the entire Tornado V will act under the influence of Chaos Control." Tails finished.

"Sonic, stop pretending that you don't know what's going on, you're smarter than that."

"You know, it's comments like that that drove us apart in the first place..."

"Sonic, if you're gonna be impossible--"

"Look, forget it, Tails, let's just get on with it."

"Yeah, yeah, I got it."

"Look, Sonic, for some reason, something's crawled up your ass today, so why the hell don't you just get rid of it? When you approached me two weeks back, it was like nothing was the matter, but now when we finally start to get places, you act all pissed off!"

"Be quiet, Tails. Don't give this to me now."

"Damnit! Every time we hook up, the same problems surface, and it all relates back to the fact that you didn't save Amy when--"

"Tails, I said shut up!"

Tails sighed again, and narrowed his eyes dangerously. "I could just as easily accomplish this mission without your help. The only reason I need you here is because without the Chaos Control, which I have yet to master myself, unlike you and Knuckles, then this entire mission would take ages longer! Plus, it helps Amy out whenever she sees you. Something in her partially roboticized brain still pines for you. But the reason she's even like that is because you didn't save her from Robotnik's machine when you could have!!"

"...."

There was an unsettling pause between the two that remained unbroken for the next couple of hours, leaving the two suspended in a deafening silence as the engine of the Tornado V hummed away monotonously. Sonic could hardly believe his ears--Tails had finally brought himself to yelling at Sonic for the heinous act that they both knew was his fault for happening. Knuckles knew about it, too--he had been there on that fateful day so many years ago. But nobody else did, aside from Eggman, of course; it was partially his fault that it happened anyway. But if all the people that Amy Rose had met in the past four years knew the entire truth to the reason why she always seemed vacant and naive, then they wouldn't help but to pity for the poor girl.

"I've spent the past four years trying to restore her, you know," Tails said softly a couple hours after the altercation occurred, daring to be the first to speak. "Four entire years of my life, dedicated to the girl I love. And even more, since I'm no closer to reversing the process. If it had been her body turned to metal rather than her brain, that would be simple; brain tissue is much harder to restore. But where have you been those four years? Certainly not by my side, or by Amy's. You're selfish, Sonic the Hedgehog...something about Shadow dying changed your attitude towards life. This is the first adventure we've been on since that day four years ago. I don't know what inside me thought that there was any chance of us ever being as close as we were before, but whatever that part of me was, it was obviously wrong."

"What are you gonna do when we find the Chaos Emerald?" Sonic asked, just as softly.

"Keep it with the other five. I still think that some secret energies that the Emeralds possess, and that we haven't discovered yet, can help me de-roboticize those parts of Amy's brain that have been so changed, but I'll need all seven to discover what it is I need to harness."

"I take it Station Square and GUN still haven't found out you have them."

"I'm still here, aren't I?" Tails turned back to Sonic and gave a weak grin.

The two were interrupted suddenly by a familiar bleeping--Tails turned his head down to the monitor set in the console in front of him and between the two handles of the steering mechanism; a small dot was blinking on the forest-green monitor punctuated with black dots, the topmost, left corner. Tails stepped down on the acceleration, and the Tornado V lurched forward--as soon as the dot, which was the Chaos Emerald they were looking for, got within a hundred meters, it began to zip in the opposite direction as the sub and its two occupants.

"Sonic, now! Use Chaos Control!" Tails urged.

"Got it!" Sonic laid a hand on the yellow-orange Emerald set in the drive device in front of him, and closed his eyes tightly. "It's been a while, but...yes, I'm feeling it..." Sonic's entire body seized, and he cried out--this was gonna hurt--"CHAOS CONTROL!" A giant electric shock was sent out through Sonic's body--he screamed, but fought back against the pain, and reminded himself that this was for Amy Rose--this was the start of making up for the sin that he had committed against his close friend.

The Tornado V continued to motor through the murky water as time itself slowed down.