Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

As he fell back to Earth, the first thing that Shadow thought of was Maria.

It wasn’t particularly surprising. He thought of her often. It was hard not to. He’d spent fifty years where time held no meaning, and the only thing he could remember was searing heat, her hand in his, and then nothing.

It was a similar heat now, he thought. Flames licked along his body, his fur glowed platinum, those strange gemstones still burrowed within his chest, and behind his eyelids burned gold.

His first thought was of Maria. It always was.

His second, though, was a new one. That other alien, the one who looked like him, with blue lightning instead of red, and kind eyes instead of hateful.

(Maria would whack him upside the head for thinking like that. You’re not hateful, Shadow, she’d insist. You’re just different. There’s nothing wrong with that.)

(Maria wasn’t here.)

The blue alien had taken those gemstones and turned golden. He’d been a shooting star, powerful and vengeful and dangerous as he barreled through the Eclipse Cannon and tackled Shadow back to Earth. It was only years of training with Chaos Energy that let him draw the gems out of the other. Those years of training did not make him fast enough to beat the blue alien back to them.

(Blue Menace, the Professor’s grandson had called him. Blue, Shadow had quietly picked instead.)

He’d seen places he’d only ever dreamed of, places straight out of Maria’s television screen or well-loved atlas. He’d been given no time to appreciate the sights though, punch after punch sending him tearing through the sky. In a way, he’d relished in it. It was vindicating, to have this being that was just like him prove that all that talk of ‘who he was inside’ was just that: talk.

Shadow had mocked him, in the crumbling ruins of something that must have once been important. The other alien had glared up at him, and his fury had been palpable, the air raging with it. 

He remembered the moment at G.U.N. headquarters, when he’d attacked Captain Walters, only it wasn’t Captain Walters, and then the blue alien was over the human, and Shadow was over Maria, and what did you do?

(What I had to.)

The moment the man’s name left his mouth, Blue let out a yell that reverberated into Shadow’s bones, and slammed into him with more power than he thought he’d ever felt in his life. The world shot past him and then away from him, and he was soaring through space as if it was nothing.

(The Moon is nearly 240,000 miles away from Earth, Maria breathed, kicking her feet behind her as one hand held her book and another ran through his quills. It takes three whole days for a rocket to get there. Isn’t that crazy?)

Three days for a rocket.

Only a few seconds for him.

Shadow had slammed into the Moon’s surface, and felt the power drain from him. As if the gemstones had deemed him unworthy too, Shadow was intensely mortal as the golden alien bore down on him, eyes glowing red in a way he’d only ever seen in the mirror.

He’d held one of the other’s hands to his chest, Chaos Energy pulsing in his veins and stopping him from burning up in the face of such power. “I’m right here!” He yelled, eyes burning and heart pounding beneath his wrist.

(The Eclipse Cannon was going to destroy the Earth, and would go along with it. Shadow was never meant to make it out of this. He didn’t want to.)

(He hoped he’d get to see Maria one more time before he was dragged down to Hell.)

Somehow, though, rather than being the final push the other alien needed, his words had been the exact opposite. Something fractured within those red eyes, and the golden being backed away, staring down at his hands. “ This is not who I am, ” he had murmured, and stepped aside. 

The gold faded into blue, taking the warmth with it, and Shadow couldn’t understand. “You won,” he’d insisted. “Take your revenge.”

Blue didn’t look at him. “There are no winners with revenge,” he said. 

There was no air, but Shadow’s breath caught in his throat, and he’d found that he didn’t really have a response to that.

Instead, he had turned his head up, and gazed off into space. There were more stars than he’d ever seen, even all those years ago, sitting with Maria atop the mountain that covered the base.

(Look at all those stars, she whispered. He couldn’t see her, but he could hear her smile. They look like diamonds.)

Shadow hadn’t looked at the stars in the days since he’d woken up. There’d been no reason to. No time. No want. Staring at them, he realized that perhaps he’d never looked because he was scared to see the same night sky staring back at him. How could the stars be just as bright and just as beautiful when Maria wasn’t there to see them?

“The last time I sat beneath stars like this,” Shadow had finally said, “I was with her. ” He swallowed. His throat hurt, and his eyes still burned, and his heart had ached so deeply he thought he might die. “I’ve felt this pain for so long, it’s all I know. ”

He hadn’t really expected much. He was alone in this, as he was in all things. Even the Professor, the only person who might know how he felt, didn’t understand, not really. Then, though, the other alien softly admitted that he did. He’d lost someone, just as Shadow had, and had felt the same pain that he did.

“Did your pain eventually… go away?” Shadow had asked. It was desperate, because he didn’t know if he could endure like this. That had been the whole point of all of this, hadn’t it? To show the world even a fraction of what he felt, and then make it so that none of them ever had to feel it again. He couldn’t see another option, one where he continued on and the pain stayed firmly within him, just as raw and angry as ever. If Blue, who had smiled and joked and cared so openly had experienced the same, then surely things must have changed for him.

“No,” the other had said. Then– “There’s something even more powerful than pain: the love we felt for each other.” He’d turned to Shadow, and his eyes were rimmed with red and his voice cracked, but he smiled anyway. “That’s what you need to hold onto, Shadow. Maria might be gone, but your love will always remain.”

Shadow’s blood rushed in his ears, pulsing in time with his heart, and a glow tugged at the edges of his vision. He had stared off over the Earth that Maria had loved just as deeply as she’d loved the stars, and the Sun burst forth from behind, flooding it with light. He thought it might be strong enough to reach into his heart, coating it in a warmth that he hadn’t felt since that night. 

It was Maria, he’d thought. She was there, with him, and for once, it didn’t hurt. The love she had for him, that he had for her— he could feel it again, nestled within his chest and holding him close, reminding him that life could be good , too.

His mind had flicked to those words he’d breathed, that night on the mountaintop. “The light shines,” he’d said, “Even though the star is gone.”

Maria was gone, but her light was still here . It lived in him, and for as long as it did, he thought he should try to prove himself worthy of it.

He’d looked out at the Eclipse Cannon, ready to destroy the world that Maria had called her home—their home. “This whole mess is my fault,” he’d said. “I’ve been so blinded by rage I thought… I had no choice.”

Blue had gotten to his feet and reached out a hand. He smiled at Shadow in a way he thought no one ever would again. “You always have a choice,” he’d said. Sunlight danced along his fur, and his eyes shined, and for just a moment Shadow forgot how to breathe. Maria was in his ear, and in Blue’s eyes, and in the stars, and she softly told him to take it.

Shadow had reached forward and grabbed Blue’s hand. “Making the right one is never easy,” the other said, and Shadow wondered how true that actually was for him. He’d believed that no one else understood, but this alien did, and perhaps he wasn’t as alone as he’d thought.

They both wore gloves—and wasn’t that strange, too—but Shadow could have sworn that sparks popped up his arm as he gripped the other’s hand in his.

“One more thing I learned,” Blue had continued, and his smile morphed into something resembling a smirk, “Is that when you really screw something up, you can’t fix it on your own.”

Shadow hadn’t been able to see the gemstones, but he could feel their Chaos Energy reacting to the desire of their wielder. He had taken Blue's other hand, and his body was alight with power.

It was different than the first time though, he’d thought. There was no fight over the energy this time, but rather a mutual share of its splendor. That made all the difference. Shadow could feel the excitement, not around the other alien, but within him. It was as if his senses had expanded, and he was something more than himself, something that extended into the other to make them two parts of one whole.

Blue—now golden—knelt down in anticipation and said, “Gotta go fast.”

Shadow had been almost instantly broken out of the moment. “Don’t tell me you’ve got a catchphrase.”

The other had grinned at him, and the only word that Shadow could really use to describe it was radiant. “That’s right, new hedgehog,” Blue had said. “And everyone loves it.”

Something akin to joy had lit in his chest, and Shadow’s ears had rung before the two of them launched off from the Moon’s surface as one. The golden alien winded around him before the two of them had shot off toward the Cannon as a single comet of blinding light.

The fight against the robots had been thrilling. Shadow didn’t allow himself to dwell on the idea of the Professor so easily turning on him. Gerald had never really cared about him the way that he had Maria. His love for Shadow had been an extension of his love for his granddaughter, and with her gone, that care faded along with it.

(If Shadow had been the one to die, the Professor never would have gone on to destroy the world. Perhaps he would have found a way to make a new one of him, just to try and stop Maria from mourning. Either way, the Earth would not be in danger, because Maria would still be there, so the Professor would have never done a thing to harm it. He would have killed anyone who dared try.)

After the last of the robots had been destroyed, the golden alien led him off toward the Cannon. They reached it just before it had fired, and the force of his own Chaos Energy pressing against him, magnified by the Cannon’s mechanisms, was almost too much to bear. In fact, if Blue  hadn’t been there, Shadow was almost certain it would be.

As the Cannon had turned and they had pressed against its beam of energy, Shadow had felt those strange gemstones trying to tug away from him, their power attempting to push out of his reach. He lashed out with his own Chaos Energy, honed for years, and pulled them closer. 

A spark of fear had erupted in his chest then, one that wasn’t his own. Over the deafening blast, the other alien had called in a strangled voice that he couldn’t hold it for much longer. Shadow turned his head and watched as brilliant gold faded to dulled blue, bright red to emerald, and for a moment time had stood still. Shadow felt something rip and then shatter within him, and the other’s soul slipped out of reach of his own.

Blue was knocked away, falling back to Earth, so small and so mortal, and Shadow couldn’t stop the Cannon anymore. Its beam just barely missed the planet, striking the Moon instead, but he couldn’t find it within himself to care.

He’d looked down, but in the moment he’d taken to reorient himself, Blue was already out of sight. His heart ached, and his throat hurt, and his eyes burned.

(Of course, his mind hissed. You finally find someone who understands, and you lose him just as easily as you lost her. That’s just what you deserve, isn’t it?)

Perhaps it was what Shadow deserved, after everything he’d done.

(Blue and Maria hadn’t deserved it, though.)

Electricity had popped off of the Cannon, despite the energy beam being gone, and he’d returned to it. The Professor was nowhere to be found, and Shadow hadn’t even bothered to ask. The grandson had gazed off at the Earth, and spoke of a poisoned atmosphere, of dead crops and melted flesh.

Shadow thought of Maria, and thought of Blue. They had both loved the Earth, he thought, and loved the people on it. He couldn’t save them, but perhaps he could save what they cared about.

(Maria would hug him before he dropped down to Hell, he was sure of it. She was kind like that. He wondered if Blue would, too. He wondered if the two of them would do it together. Blue and Maria would be friends, Shadow thought. Good friends.)

(He wished he could have been a part of it.)

The grandson went to try and stabilize the reactors, and Shadow stripped himself of his inhibitor rings. Never take these off, Shadow, the Professor had once said. They’re not for our safety, but for yours. You won’t be able to control your Chaos Energy without these on. It will kill you.

Shadow didn’t need to be safe, though. What he needed was as much power as possible, as quickly as possible. The gemstones had reacted eagerly to the boost, and he’d pushed the station as far as he could as quickly as he could. Images of Maria echoed in his mind, and he liked to believe that she was calling to him, waiting for him, guiding him home.

There was a shudder beneath his hands, and all at once the Cannon had exploded. Shadow welcomed it as he was flung backward through space. He had closed his eyes and accepted the darkness as it came.

He woke up falling.

He thought of Maria first. He always did.

Then, he thought of Blue.

Shadow was still alive, agonizingly alive. The gems within him wrapped him in their power. He had no doubt that they had kept his heart beating, kept his lungs breathing. He remembered as they’d tried to pull away from him, and wondered if they’d been attempting to return to their original wielder. Had Blue been sharing their power with him, only for Shadow to rip it away when he needed it most?

Blue had spared his life, turned him on the right path, and Shadow had thanked him with a death sentence.

(Just another debt he’d never be able to repay.)

He hurtled toward the Earth, and barely had a chance to brace for impact before he hit the ground.

He was in a field. There were hills in the distance. The sun was setting, golden light painting the landscape. The gemstones rattled within him, and ached to emerge. For a moment, Shadow considered letting them. He’d die, he was sure. Whatever Chaos Energy was within them was helping to manage his own, even without the inhibitor rings. If they left him, he was sure he’d succumb before he even had a chance to think about it.

Then, though, he thought of Blue again. He thought of Blue’s family, his Tom, who might be alive or might be dead. He thought of the human woman with them, and the other two aliens, who had called themselves teammates but who might as well be brothers. 

Shadow might have killed one member of their family. He’d certainly let another die. He couldn’t just let himself fade away without at least saying that he was sorry.

(Plus , Maria murmured in his ear, You need to find out his name. He knew yours.)

(Blue laughed, high and bright. That’s right! It’s only fair!)

He and Maria might have high-fived, but Shadow had no way of knowing. He allowed himself a small smile anyway.

Chapter Text

Shadow found one inhibitor ring in a crater near where he landed. The other seemed to be lost for good, but he had two on his ankles and one on his wrist, and the gemstones seemed to think that it was enough. The moment he snapped the ring on, they forced themselves from his chest, the platinum power vanishing with them. 

He stared at them as they sat in his hand. It probably wasn’t a great idea to leave them lying around. They offered up their Chaos Energy so willingly, he thought even those who didn’t know how to harness it might be able to figure it out. 

He darted into a nearby town the moment night truly fell, teleporting into the closest store, finding a jacket, and leaving with no one any the wiser. The gems fit snugly in a pocket, shut tight with both a button and a zipper.

(Be careful , Maria said gently. And not just with those.)

He was returning to the field to check for the other inhibitor ring one more time when helicopter blades thrummed overhead. Shadow ducked into a ditch the moment he spotted the G.U.N. logo along the trucks trailing behind it. He couldn’t risk running or teleporting away, lest they see the flash of light and give chase.

His hearing was better than most, though, and it didn’t take any strain to make out the words being said by the soldiers.

“Director Rockwell,” one said gruffly.

“Is it here?” A woman asked. Shadow had heard her voice before, but only distantly. She was one of the G.U.N. higher-ups, he was pretty sure about that.

“The specimen is gone,” the soldier replied, and Shadow dug claws into his palm to help hold back a growl. Specimen. That was all he was to them. “Even with its biology, there’s no way the impact was survivable.”

Rockwell hummed. “ All the better for us ,” she said. “ What of the jewels? ”

The gemstones shuddered in his pocket. He placed a hand over them to hold them still.

“Not here, either, ma’am. Should we inform the Wachowskis–”

“No,” Rockwell said sharply. “They have no clearance, and no reason to know about any of this. Frankly, they are lucky that they have been forgiven for their involvement. I long told Commander Walters that such powerful artifacts should not be in the hands of aliens . When they are found, they will remain firmly in G.U.N.’s possession, where they belong. The Wachowskis and their extraterrestrial pets will see not a facet of them again, as long as I have anything to say about it.”

(Pets? Blue asked, offense clear in his tone. It’s not like we’re animals!)

Shadow had wondered where Blue had gotten the gemstones. He’d thought perhaps G.U.N., but wasn’t sure if he believed the organization would give such immense power to any alien, even one that was working for them. It seemed that he was right.

He tucked himself farther into the ditch and waited for G.U.N. to leave. A few remained, but once most had cleared out, Shadow snuck along the indent in the ground before making a break for the forest. He heard no cries of alarm, no rumble of wheels following him, and picked up speed the moment he hit the treeline.

The Wachowskis. That must have been Blue’s family. It was a unique name, but he was not such a fool to think it unique enough to only belong to them. Shadow needed a way to figure out where they lived.

How in the world was he supposed to do that?

(You already know, Maria said.)

He didn’t. Maria didn’t know what she was talking about. Shadow didn’t even know the other alien’s name , let alone where he lived.

(Blue snickered. C’mon, dude. Did we soul-bond for nothing?)

Shadow sighed, breath heavy in his chest, and skidded to a stop. He was in Iowa, he knew that from one of the signs he’d seen while stealing the jacket. Shadow had spent most of his life in the laboratory–at least most of the life that he could remember. There’d been mountains, and no civilization around for miles, but the Professor had never said what state they were in and Shadow had never asked. He’d known the way back because the Professor had drawn him back. 

He didn’t think it would help him find Blue’s family either way.

(You’re embarrassing me, New Hedgehog, Blue chirped. We all but become one, and you can’t even figure out where I’m from?)

Shadow ignored the ‘hedgehog’ part, because no matter how many times he heard it, it still made no sense. Maria had wondered if he was part-hedgehog before, just because of his quills, but he wasn’t . Shadow was an alien , just like Blue was. There wasn’t anything Earth-like about him at all.

Instead, he tried to focus on the strange connection that he’d formed with Blue when those gemstones bestowed both of them with their power.

There were feelings first, the excitement and the love and the fear . Then, past that, there were flashes that he could just barely catch with each one. Sunlight against fur and shoes against the ground for the first. An owl with raised wings, green lightning, and an endless fall to Earth for the third. And then, for the second, there were the humans, and the other two aliens, and the owl again with a gentle smile. There was running, and laughing, and a tight embrace, and Welcome to Green Hills: The Little Town with a Big Heart. Past that, inexplicably, there was Shadow’s own face staring back at him, shining in the sunlight on the Moon and gleaming platinum in the expanse of space. 

He tore himself from his thoughts before he could dwell on that too long. Blue had barely known him, and for most of that time at least one of them had been trying to kill the other. There was no love between them–not from Blue’s end–and he was dead , so what did it matter anyway?

Shadow pushed the musings down further, his heartbeat in his ears. Green Hills. That was what he needed to know. That was all he needed to know. The gemstones in his pocket seemed to sing to him.

(Blue chuckled. You can’t run forever.)

He scowled. What, was Blue going to stop him?

(Maria sighed. You don’t have to be mean, Shadow. It’s not his fault he’s dead.)

She was right. It was Shadow’s fault. He allowed himself a moment to grind his teeth, a moment for his eyes to stop burning, before he set off to find another town.

Chapter Text

Shadow had found no reason to learn how any of Earth’s new technology worked. He wouldn’t be around long enough to use it, and the Professor and his grandson had a good enough grasp for any of them. 

He regretted it now, as the library’s computer blinked innocently at him, offering an easy solution to his problem if he only knew how to use it. 

He pushed away the urge to punch it, or use his Chaos Energy to overload the systems. He was already taking a risk by standing here in waking hours. It was early, but there were still a few people dotted about, and it took every bit of his self-control to stop his quills from raising whenever one of them looked at him.

A presence appeared behind him, looming over his shoulder, and Shadow said, “I don’t need any assistance. Thank you.”

The person hummed. “Interesting look you’ve got going on there.”

Shadow set his jaw. “It’s a costume.”

A laugh. “Hell of a costume, kiddo.”

His hand curled over the computer mouse, and he felt the cheap plastic start to give way under his grip. “Did you need something?”

“Nothing that I can’t get myself,” the person replied. “But it’s never below me to ask for help.”

Shadow scoffed. “And you expect to get that from me?”

“That remains to be seen,” they said. “But in my experience, Mobians have a tendency to be full of surprises.”

It was said with intent, as if the words were supposed to mean something to him. As it was, Shadow raised a single eyebrow and continued to try and break through the computer’s lock screen with his mind.

(Glare harder, Blue teased. That’ll do it.)

The person clicked their tongue. “No? Huh. Surprising. I would’ve thought—”

“Either get to the point or leave me alone,” Shadow cut them off.

They huffed, clearly amused. “All right, darling. You need help. Information, I presume. I can provide that, as long as you help me in exchange.”

“What do you think I could do to help you? ” Shadow asked.

“Oh, I don’t know,” they crooned. “But I’m sure we could figure something out.”

(There’s nothing wrong with accepting help, Maria said. Or giving it.)

Shadow wasn't sure if he would call the offer help. No one offered help up so freely.

(I did, Blue said.)

(So did I, Maria added.)

Very few people offered help up so freely. Shadow didn't have much experience with the world, but he was quite sure that Maria and Blue rested solidly in the minority.

Still, the computer screen dimmed, a message popping up about lack of activity, and Maria’s words tittered in his head.

“Fine,” Shadow said, getting to his feet. “I help you, you help me.”

“Lovely.” They reached a hand out, extending just slightly into his view. “Shake on it.”

Shadow scrunched his nose before turning around, finally getting a view of his new temporary ally. There really wasn’t a reason to be nervous. The person was a regular human woman, relatively young, with tanned skin, short white hair, and teeth that looked just a bit too sharp. Shadow thought even Maria would say that the pink of the woman’s shirt was too bright, but it was tempered by the crisp leather jacket she wore over it. The most noticeable thing was the shining purple gem that clung to a choker around her neck. Shadow wondered if it was uncomfortable.

They shook hands. “What’s your name, hun?” She asked.

“Shadow,” he replied gruffly.

“Fitting,” she said. “I’m Rouge. It’s lovely to be working with you.”

(Look at you, making friends, Blue laughed. I’m so proud.)

“Sure,” Shadow said. “Are we going to do this or not?”

“Straight to business,” she mused. “All right. How about we grab something to drink and go from there?”

Reluctantly, Shadow trailed after her. She led him out of the library and down the block to some sort of small shop. More smells than he could count hit his noise as they entered, earthy and bitter and sweet and a dozen more he couldn’t quite identify.

“You sit down, hun,” she said. “I’ll grab you something, my treat. Hot chocolate?”

Shadow didn’t know what that was.

“Good choice,” Rouge nodded after he didn’t respond. She nudged him toward the tables before turning to the human worker. “Comic Con,” she said, as if that meant anything, before launching into questions about flavor shots. Shadow tuned her out and slid into a booth in the corner, the most isolated spot he could see.

He drummed his fingers against the table, ignoring the steady pounding in his head and the pulsing of the gemstones in his pocket.

Was it desperate to form an agreement with this woman? She seemed to know more about him than he wanted anyone to, or at least seemed to see through his lies. Her gaze made him want to squirm, as if he was an open book for her delicate and sharp perusal. 

(You wear your heart on your sleeve, Maria giggled. I’d be more surprised if she didn’t know what you were thinking.)

Rouge slipped into the booth across from him, handing him a cup that was hot to the touch.

“I’d let it cool a bit—” Her words fell away as Shadow took a deep drink. It was sweet, and creamy, and warm, and he heard Maria sigh right along with him. “Okay then,” Rouge said. “That works too.”

They sat in silence for a minute, Shadow all but inhaling his drink while Rouge opened the lid of hers, poured what looked to be sugar inside, and carefully stirred it.

Finally, she spoke. “So, what were you looking for?”

“A town called Green Hills,” Shadow replied.

Rouge cocked her head to the side. “Could be a few like that. Any more details?”

Shadow closed his eyes for a moment and dug into his mind, searching for the image of the sign again. “Mountains,” he said. “Trees. Just under two-thousand people.”

She pointed at him with her stirrer. “That’s what I’m looking for.” Rouge took a slow sip of her drink. “I can find the town you want, and I can get you there, but-” She rubbed two fingers together- “I’ll need compensation.”

“You want me to get you money?” Shadow asked skeptically.

Rouge laughed. “Oh no, darling, I can get that all on my own, trust me. I deal in more valuable currencies. Information, often, but something tells me you won’t be particularly forthcoming with anything that I would like to know.”

She was right. There wasn’t any way that he was going to tell her a thing about where he came from, about the facility or the asteroid or the Cannon, about Maria or Blue. 

He narrowed his eyes at her. She looked satisfied. “Exactly.”

“I presume you’re willing to deal in something else?” Shadow pressed.

“Of course,” she said. “You see, the information I collect is all to make it easier to get what I really want.”

“Which is?”

She grinned, and her teeth gleamed. “Jewels.”

“Jewels,” Shadow repeated flatly.

“Indeed.” Rouge spun her stirrer between her fingers. “I’ve been called the best jewel thief in the universe, and not for nothing.”

“Okay,” Shadow said slowly. “Then if you’re so good, what do you want from me?”

Rouge hummed. “We could start with those little treasures in your pocket.”

Shadow’s blood ran cold, and his hand shot up to cover the pocket with the gemstones in it. His Chaos Energy reached out to them, and a bit of the tension bled from his bones when all seven were accounted for.

(No! Blue cried, desperation clawing at Shadow’s heart. No, she can't have those! Those aren't for her!)

He glared at her. “No.”

She let out a bark of a laugh. “‘No?’”

“You can’t have these,” Shadow said firmly. “They aren’t for sale.”

“Oh, come now,” she said. “I heard them sing as we walked. They’re small, there’s only a handful at most. I’m sure they’d be much happier with me than they would be with you.”

“You cannot take them,” Shadow growled. They weren’t for her. They weren’t even for Shadow. They were for Blue , and they were for Blue’s family. “I will tear off the hand that dares try.”

Rouge scoffed. “Protective, much? Now you’ve got me curious.”

“They’re not mine.” Shadow’s mouth was dry. “They’re— They belonged to my—my— To Blue. Now, they belong with his family. That is where they are going.”

“I suppose I can respect an heirloom for a dead friend,” she shrugged.

“Not my friend,” Shadow said, because even though he couldn’t quite explain why, that didn’t feel right. Not for Blue.

(I’m hurt, Blue said.)

Rouge smirked. “Something different, then. All right. I’ll leave your Blue’s jewels alone. You’ll have to help me get something else, though, to make up for the loss.”

“If you show me what to take,” Shadow said, “I can take it.”

(Confident , Blue laughed. It’s a good look on you.)

“Well—” Rouge’s smile widened, a predator closing in on its prey. Shadow wasn’t going to be the prey. Not if he had anything to say about it. “If that isn’t exactly what I like to hear.”

(She’s scary, Maria said, intrigued, and he could hear the grin on her face.)

(I like her! Blue exclaimed, and laughed again.)

Chapter Text

“C’mon, kid,” Rouge said, getting to her feet as the train began to slow. “This is our stop.”

“Not a kid,” Shadow replied, following her and leaping off the train car’s roof onto the gravel below.

“Of course you are,” she said easily, tapping him on the nose before he could blink. “You’ve still got baby fat. Don’t try to lie to me. Enjoy being young while you can.”

(She’s right, Maria said cheerfully. Like it or not, you’re not grown up yet.)

Shadow crossed his arms and moved to catch up.

“Where are we?” He asked, eyeing the looming buildings in the distance. The city reminded him of Tokyo, with towers that seemed to reach for the clouds. He hadn’t really been afforded much time to enjoy the town.

(Sorry, Blue winced. How about we all just blame G.U.N. and call it a day?)

Well, Shadow was always happy to blame G.U.N. for something.

“Welcome to Chicago!” Rouge exclaimed, spreading her arms out. “The Windy City! Or at least the outskirts of it.”

“What are we doing here?” Shadow’s fingers twitched as he looked at the scale of the city they were steadily approaching. There must be so many people there. He curled his hands into fists.

“Why, taking in the sights, of course,” Rouge said. “And I suppose a little heist, if we’ve got time for it.”

“What kind of heist?”

Rouge slipped a piece of paper out of her bag and handed it to him. It was a pamphlet for a gallery of some sort. “Some rich kid’s rich kid decided to become an artist, and a gallery for someone of such prestige needs something to draw in the masses, doesn’t it?” She pulled back the front of the pamphlet to reveal the image of a giant yellow jewel printed on the glossy page within. “The Tiffany Yellow Diamond. Eighty-two facets, nearly one-hundred-and-thirty carats, and absolutely gorgeous. It’s normally in New York, but sometimes goes out on loan. This is one such time.”

Shadow didn’t really know what she was talking about, but she sounded passionate, and the jewel looked impressive, at least in the picture. “I’m assuming you want to steal it?”

“Oh, no, darling, I’m going to steal it,” she said, grinning. “And you’re going to help me.”

(This would make such a good movie! Blue said giddily.)

(If only we had popcorn, Maria added.)

“Great,” Shadow said, folding the pamphlet back up. “Let’s do it.”

Rouge’s plan was relatively simple, an easy sneak-in and sneak-out deal. She took care of the cameras, and would handle the Diamond’s container, making sure not to trip any alarms. All Shadow had to do was keep an eye and ear out for any actual guards. He’d been expecting something much more difficult, but didn’t mind the simplicity of the task.

The gallery itself was boring. The floors were polished marble, and the walls were white, and there were at least six more stories above. They were in a sort of atrium, the higher floors visible along the sides, winding up toward a glass ceiling that he thought must have been more than two-hundred feet above. The lights of the city were bright enough that he couldn’t see the stars.

Shadow’s attention drifted to the art. He wondered why anyone would find it interesting. The paintings on the wall looked like nothing more than splashes of color with no real meaning to them. 

(But it might mean something to the person who painted them, Maria pointed out.)

(Yeah, Blue agreed. Like maybe they only use their favorite colors!)

Perhaps there was something behind each one, but as Shadow stared at them, he didn’t really feel any way in particular. 

“Why did they make these?” He asked, furrowing his brow at one. It was labeled ‘Turmoil,’ and the top was covered in mismatched colors while the bottom half had only a dark semicircle. He didn’t understand it.

“Well, the pamphlet said it was their passion,” Rouge replied. She was at the center of the room, fiddling with her tools. The Tiffany Yellow Diamond was dull beneath the glass, the lack of light doing it no favors. “And who knows? Maybe it is. Or maybe it’s just a way for them to seem pretentious and interesting in front of their friends. It’s anyone’s guess.”

“I thought information was your thing,” Shadow said.

Rouge let out a shocked laugh and threw him a grin over her shoulder. Despite the dim light, her teeth still glinted unnaturally. He’d never seen another human’s teeth do that. Maybe it was genetic. “Nice one, kid.”

He opened his mouth to argue.

(Kid! Maria crowed. My kid! My kid brother, Shadow.)

Blue’s laughter joined hers, ringing in his ears.

He tugged at the edge of one of his gloves and stayed quiet.

Rouge went back to her work, and a calm fell over the gallery again. 

It didn’t last long.

(Wait, Blue said, voicing the sudden tension Shadow felt, Something’s not right.)

His nerves were buzzing, and his ear twitched. A small shing sounded from the wall behind him, and he bent his knees, ready to move at a moment’s notice. He saw what might be a golden shine extend over the floor. “Rouge—” Shadow called tentatively, only to choke on his words as an arm swept around his body, something sharp coming up to press against his neck.

Rouge froze. A vein moved in her neck, and she delicately placed her tools down, turning to face Shadow and the new intruders.

“Vice,” she said, voice low. “And your little pets.”

“We’re partners,” another voice said, higher-pitched.

“Oh, I’m sure you think that, Fable.” Rouge ran her finger down the side of the case. The Diamond sat tauntingly within. “But let’s not dance about. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Nothing much. You’ve got a high bounty on your head,” a deeper voice said, toward Shadow’s left. “Enough to pay off our own.”

Rouge snorted. “On what, two planets at most? I don’t expect too  many of them will be willing to forget when you stormed that festival some time ago. So public.” She grinned. “I’d dare to call it amateur. Like it or not, darling, I’m better than you. I don’t need to hurt people to get the things that I want.”

“Two planets is better than none,” the voice—Vice—said. “Having you out of the way is just a bonus.”

“You don’t even respect the craft,” Rouge said. It sounded like she was scolding them, like Gerald whenever Maria and Shadow were busted for stealing a key card, right before she pulled out the sad eyes and convinced him to let them off with nothing more than a warning. “You resell jewels as quickly as you steal them.”

(How dare they! Blue gasped dramatically. Not holding onto the precious gems they take? For shame.)

Vice chuckled. “We all get by in different ways, Bat. I don’t judge you—”

“You very much do.”

“-You don’t judge me,” he finished as if she hadn’t said anything.

Rouge sighed. “What do you want, Vice?”
“You.”

The gem around her neck gleamed. “Oh, you couldn’t afford me, honey.”

Maria and Blue cackled, the sound bouncing around his mind as Vice sputtered.

“Look,” he managed to say, “There’s only one way this goes.” He stepped forward, and into Shadow’s vision. It was a bit of a shock. He was another alien, with jagged hair, strange markings around his eyes, and a bushy striped tail. 

(Like a raccoon, Maria said.)

Shadow finally registered the feeling of the arm that restrained him, how the skin was cold and scaled. The sharp thing against his neck was curved, like a claw.

“Is that right?” Rouge asked, somehow completely unperturbed by their company.

“You come with us,” Vice said. He paused. “And you bring that jewel with you.”

Rouge glanced back at the Tiffany Diamond. “What, this little thing? It’s hardly anything, not even worth the time—”

“Scrap,” Vice ordered, “Show her how worth it we think it is.”

Shadow was held tighter, and the claw pressed against the softest part of his throat. He could feel his pulse pounding against it.

(Get out of there, Maria urged. You can do it. Get out.)

(No , Blue cut in. Just wait.)

Shadow stayed still.

“It’s the jewel,” a raspy voice by his ear said, “Or the kid’s neck.”

“He’s not a part of this,” Rouge said sharply. “He owes me a favor, that’s it. I just met him today. Let him go, and we’ll figure this out between us.”

“Well, you were right about one thing, Bat,” Vice said, tail swishing lazily. “We’re not afraid to hurt people to get what we want.”

Rouge glanced at him, something unidentifiable in her eyes. After a long moment, she turned back to the Diamond’s case. “Fine.”

She got to work, and the claw didn’t lower from Shadow’s throat. Vice moved closer to Rouge, keeping a careful eye on her, and the second person stepped into Shadow’s view. They were a bird-like alien, with sleek black feathers along their body and dark wings sprouting out from their back.

(You think they look like a raven? Maria pondered.)

(Maybe a crow, Blue said.)

(Or a grackle! Maria laughed.)

One of her favorite books to read with him had been on birds, organized by color and then letter. One of her favorite of the black birds had been the grackle, whose name she never managed to make it through without laughing. 

Shadow’s heart ached at the memory. 

“Fable,” Vice said, and the feathered alien skipped over to him. “Keep an eye on the Bat.”

“Oh, wonderful,” Rouge muttered, not taking her eyes off of the case. “We’ll have a girls’ night.”

Vice approached Shadow, appraising him. “Dangerous company you keep, kid,” he said. There was a distinct lack of the fondness with which Rouge used the nickname. 

Shadow scowled. “I’m not the one you should be telling that to.”

Vice snickered. “A real tough guy, huh? Well, you’ll have to work a little harder than that to scare me, friend. I’ve gotten away from the last Echidna Warrior before.”

“Only because that Knucklehead realized you were just all talk,” Rouge called from where she worked. 

“I didn’t think you’d met him, Bat,” Vice said.

“I haven’t,” Rouge replied. “But knowing things is what I do.”

“That and taking too damn long,” the raspy voice holding Shadow growled. “Pick it up.”

“So impatient, Scrap,” Rouge said. “Really, what would your mother think?”

Another tense few moments passed, and then there was a soft click and Rouge exhaled. She pulled off the case covering, taking the Tiffany Yellow Diamond in her gloved hands.

“Finally.” Vice turned back to her, grinning sharply. “Give it here.”

Rouge stared down at the jewel, conflict clear on her face. She glanced up at Shadow.

(Do it! Maria exclaimed. Go!)

(Wait, Blue murmured.)

Shadow wondered if Blue had ever waited for anything in his life. Probably not. He listened anyway, not too concerned with thinking about the hypocrisy of the voice in his head.

Rouge looked at the Diamond again. Her lips were pulled into a tight line.

“I won’t ask again, Bat,” Vice said, tone low and threatening.

Shadow’s Chaos Energy bubbled up in his gut, ready to be used at a moment’s notice.

(Wait…)

A beat, and then Rouge’s shoulder sank. Her hand began to move, Diamond held tight in her fingers. 

His Energy reached a boiling point in his chest.

(Now!)

Shadow focused his Chaos Energy and teleported. His captor, Scrap, was dragged right along with him, grip loosening as they landed a few feet from Vice and Rouge. Shadow wrenched his way from Scrap’s hold and kicked him back the moment he was free.

Vice choked on his breath in his surprise. Rouge was frozen too, but only for a moment, as she was almost immediately tackled by the bird-like alien, Fable.

Shadow flashed behind Vice and aimed a kick toward his head. It didn’t land, but he was sure he could do this longer than the other could dodge. Shadow just needed a few good hits in, and he would be victorious. Rouge was wrestling with Fable, and looked closer to winning than the latter did.

In the tussle, though, both of them seemed to forget about Scrap. 

The lizard-like alien tackled Rouge from the side, and she was sprawled out over the floor. Her hair was miraculously in the exact same style, despite the fight. Her clothes weren’t messed up either. It was frankly rather impressive. Vice tried to grab at one of Shadow's ears, and he was forced to return his attention back to his own fight.

“No!” He heard Rouge cry as he weaved away from one of Vice’s fists. “Fable! Get back here, you coward!”

The feathered alien was in the air, soaring on dark wings up through the atrium, toward the glass ceiling. Scrap held Rouge to the ground, pulling her arm back as she struggled to reach for the jewel around her neck.

Vice let out a cackle, and Shadow took the opportunity to catch him off-guard, activating his air shoes and kicking the other alien away with a burst of extra force. He gathered his Chaos Energy, eyed Fable, and teleported to her side, grabbing onto her mid-air.

(Careful! Maria said.)

They struggled as Fable’s flight faltered, Shadow batting at her and reaching for the Diamond. He’d flash to another side, confusing her as best he could.

Eventually, Fable let out a squawk of frustration. She shifted, grabbed something off her belt. Shadow went for the Diamond again, fingers brushing against it, and a cuff was slammed onto his wrist.

There was a beat, during which the world stood still. Then, the Chaos Energy in his body roared , flickering over his quills, and Shadow’s muscles spasmed. Fable took the distraction, kicking him away and yelping when red lightning danced up her own body, and he felt himself hang in the air for a split-second before he began to fall.

(Go! Maria cried. Flash back to the ground!)

(Yeah, I thought you were supposed to be fast, Blue said, betrayed by the fear in his voice. What’s taking you so long?)

Through the haze of the storm in his head and the fire in his blood, Shadow tried to reach for his Chaos Energy. It reached back, bucking wildly, but something stopped him from grabbing it. The ground was fast-approaching, and Shadow wasn’t sure how long he had to force his way past the block.

“Shadow! ” Below him there was a flash of pink light, a raspy grunt, and then something slammed into from the side, knocking the wind out of him as it did. He felt arms wind around him, and the descent slowed until he was eventually lowered gently to the ground.

He moved to get up, trying to push past the twitching in his limbs and the barrier in front of his Chaos Energy. He felt oddly empty , almost like the moments after Blue fell to Earth, their souls ripped apart from one another. Shadow had always had his Chaos Energy, and had always been able to use it. Having it within him, unable to be reached or controlled, made his chest ache. It was like losing an intrinsic piece of himself.

(You know what that feels like, Maria and Blue said as one.)

“Stay down, hun,” Rouge’s voice said from above. Her hand pressed on his shoulder, pushing him back to the floor. Shadow looked up at her and blinked in confusion at what he saw.

It was an alien , with white fur and tanned skin and adorned in a familiar shade of hot pink. Wings fanned out from the back, thin with sharp edges.

(Huh, Blue murmured. ‘Bat’ indeed.)

Rouge—because that was Rouge, wasn’t it—glanced down at him and smirked, flashing her teeth that glinted in such an inhuman way. “Don’t look so surprised, hun. You’re really more confusing than I am.”

There wasn’t much time to talk. She sprang away from him, going after a disoriented Fable only for Scrap, on the ground, to swipe at her leg. Rouge’s wings flapped to pull her above his reach, but Vice leaped onto her back, bringing her down to the ground.

The three got to their feet and stood above her as she gasped for breath. Shadow didn’t particularly blame her. It had been a long night.

“Who knew all we needed to take down the Bat,” Vice chuckled, “Was one damn kid.”

Fable, half-leaning on her knees, passed a pouch to Scrap, who opened it and dug around within, handing something small and golden to Vice.

“Come now,” Rouge said, voice a bit strained. “If they take me away, who’s left for you to have fun with?”

“We have plenty of fun without you in the way,” Vice replied easily. He rolled the gold—a ring—between his fingers.

Shadow balled his hands into fists and reached for his Chaos Energy one more time. It responded to his call, and clawed at the strange barrier, tearing through it until Shadow finally felt something spark within him, buzzing with anticipation.

Red lightning flickered quietly over his quills. The three intruders didn’t see it, but Rouge did. She met his eyes, gave the smallest nod, and bent her head to one side and then the other. Shadow set his jaw and inclined his head in return.

(You’ve got this, Maria said.)

(Remember Tokyo? Blue asked. These guys are nothing!)

It was true. Shadow didn’t have a great sample size, but none of the aliens he'd met had Chaos Energy anywhere close to the level Blue did. He could handle these ones perfectly fine.

Vice opened his mouth to speak, Shadow gathered his Energy, and shot off toward the three, crashing into them and sliding past. 

Rouge snatched the ring, relinquished from Vice’s grip, out of the air and tossed it to the side. It spun and expanded in size, showing a pink desert within its depths.

Shadow didn’t think about it long. He pushed off of the wall and slammed into the group again, channeling Chaos Energy into the hit. A wave of sparks blew out over the floor, and the group flew back, shooting through the ring which slid closed behind them.

The power in the building went out as the wave of Energy flooded over it.

(Wow , Blue said. It really is just like Tokyo.)

Shadow’s chest heaved. His body ached, and the strange cuff around his wrist burned where it touched.

Rouge, hovering a few inches above, let her feet hit the ground. “Well, that was fun,” she said.

Shadow glared at her, and she grinned back before plucking the pouch of rings from the ground, where Scrap must have dropped them when they were hit.

Something whirred, and the power in the gallery flickered back on, joined immediately by blaring alarms.

“All right, let’s not dally,” Rouge said. She drew a ring from the pouch and flicked it into the air. It expanded, showing the train yard on the other side. She dragged Shadow through, and the strange portal closed behind them, the sound of alarms fading with it.

Rouge sighed and ran a hand down her face. “What a waste of time,” she muttered.

In the pocket close to his chest, Blue’s gemstones were a comforting warmth. Shadow shoved a hand into a different pocket, letting out a small breath when he found its contents still within.

“I wouldn’t call it a total loss,” he said, pulling his hand out and extending it toward Rouge, the Tiffany Yellow Diamond resting in his palm.

She blinked at the jewel, and then at him, and then grinned. “So, where was it you wanted to go again?”

Chapter Text

Shadow’s wrist twinged with pain, the cuff seeming to flare as his Chaos Energy attempted to fight against it.

“You okay?” Rouge asked, a step ahead of him.

(No, Blue said.)

“Fine,” Shadow managed through gritted teeth. “Keep moving.”

She shrugged and continued walking. In the distance, the city lights glittered, peaking over treetops. Even though they were well away from the busy streets and looming skyscrapers, it was still too bright to see many stars, and the sky’s darkness was beginning to seep away as dawn approached. Shadow’s Chaos Energy was angry at its subjugation, but there was little time to do anything now. Rouge wanted to find them a ride before day truly arrived, leaving Chicago with the rising sun behind them.

“Not much farther,” she said even though he hadn’t asked. “Another street up from here.”

Shadow had no clue where they were—some sort of industrial kind of area, perhaps. They’d passed a junkyard or two, as well as an intersection with four competing gas stations. Rouge kept glancing down at a device in her hand, following whatever instructions it told her.

(A map the size of her palm, Maria said, awed. You could explore the whole world with something like that and be back in time for dinner.)

Finally, she dragged him into a small alley.

“All right,” she said. “You stay here, I’ll get us a car.”

Shadow scrunched his nose. “How are you going to do that?”

Rouge chuckled, flicking a card out from her bag as if it was supposed to mean something. “I told you before, hun: money is not a concern of mine. I certainly have plenty enough to go around.”

She fiddled with the jewel at her neck, and her appearance flickered into that of a human again. 

He narrowed his eyes. “How do you do that?”

Rouge clicked her tongue. “It’s not replicable, I’m afraid. There’s only a dozen Chameleon Quartz in the universe, and eleven of them are sitting safely in a museum a hundred solar systems from here.”

(Can you ask her what it feels like being the coolest person in the world? Blue fawned.)

“And the twelfth?” He asked instead, ignoring Blue’s question as his gaze flicked to the choker.

She grinned. “I don’t call myself the best jewel thief in the universe for nothing , you know. This one was considered lost to time, until some archeologist uncovered a map to it. I beat some of the best treasure hunters to its location and took it. Thought it would just be a nice addition to my collection, but it turns out that it’s able to do what no technology can yet—disguise not just your appearance, but your entire species. Makes blending in a lot easier.”

“I’d assume,” Shadow said. The Chaos Energy in his body bucked against the cuff again, and he set his jaw. “Go get the car. I don’t want to wait any longer than I have to.”

“Someone’s testy ,” she said, but straightened her jacket and confidently slipped from the alley, the sharp clicking of her steps audible long after she’d gone.

Shadow looked down at the cuff secured around his wrist. It was a dull silver where his inhibitor rings were gold, a thin band of low red light wrapped around the middle. He had wanted to get it off from the moment it’d been snapped on, but as his Chaos Energy raged against it, he wondered if it was a very good idea.

The Energy had originally been manageable even with one inhibitor missing, but whatever this strange cuff was confined it in a way it never had been before. Even if there was a way for him to get it off, he wasn’t sure that his Chaos Energy would be content with settling back down as it had originally. With no other inhibitor—and no way to get one—it seemed that he might be stuck with the cuff for a while, regardless of the pain that it caused.

There was a honk from the alley entrance, and Shadow jumped, sparks dancing over his fur and quills raising in defense.

Rouge—still appearing as a human—leaned out of the window of a simple burgundy car. She grinned at him. “Get in loser, we’re going shopping!”

(Yes! Maria exclaimed. We should get a coloring book! In case it’s a long trip.)

(Or some comic books! Blue cut in excitedly. Oh! Or both!)

Shadow scowled, forcing his nerves to calm and zipping over to the other side of the vehicle. They started moving before he’d even gotten the door closed.

“Going shopping?” Shadow asked, raising an eyebrow. “I was not aware we needed anything.”

“No, hun, it’s from Mean Girls,” Rouge said. “You know, the movie?” Shadow stared blankly at her. “You must not have been on this planet for very long—put on your seatbelt—Don’t know how to work computers, don’t know movies—”

“I know movies,” Shadow said, bristling. He looked at where her seatbelt began and mirrored grabbing the one on his side. He struggled putting it into the buckle, but bared his teeth when she reached over to help, finally clicking it in on his own. “And I’ve been here longer than you.”

“Oh, yeah?” The corners of her mouth curled. “How long?”

(She’s good, Blue said.)

Shadow was inclined to agree. Her skill at digging for information was rather impressive, but she was going to have to try a little harder than that to get anything out of him.

Instead, he crossed his arms and remained quiet, turning his attention to the car window. They were driving through a rather simple neighborhood, dozens of houses that looked the same other than the color of their paneling or the cleanliness of their lawn.

Rouge seemed content with letting the silence remain, pulling out that same device again and tapping on it with one hand, the other staying on the wheel. After glancing at the screen, she set it sideways in a cupholder and turned at the next street.

“Do you know where you’re going?” Shadow finally asked. Rouge turned again, and he was jerked back a bit as the engine of the car roared. They zipped down a ramp, quickly matching speed with other fast-moving cars as they deftly merged in with them.

“Of course,” Rouge replied. “Green Hills, Montana. It’s the only one that matched up with your description. The ones in Tennessee and Pennsylvania had too many and too few people respectively. New Hampshire’s was just a nature preserve.” She tapped her nails against the steering wheel. “Wish it was one of those. This one is by far the farthest away.”

(Wonder how long it’d take to run there, Blue said.)

“How long will it take to get there?” 

Rouge hummed, her eyes flicking back down to the device’s screen. “Just under a day, if we don’t stop. Plan for mid-morning tomorrow. I’ll need a few hours of sleep if I’m gonna get us there in one piece.”

Her bag sat in the back seat, the tip of the ring pouch poking out of it. “Why not use one of those portal rings again?”

“I’m in no hurry,” she said. “The highway will work fine. Plus, you need to be able to visualize what you want the other side to look like. I could find a picture on Google, I’m sure, but I’m in no rush to waste those. I’d prefer to wait a bit longer before having to head back to Mobius to try and get more.”

Mobius. It sounded like the thing she had called him at the library: Mobian. Another planet, perhaps? Maybe it was where he came from. As much as Shadow craved more information, he didn’t want to be in Rouge’s debt again. This trip was her holding up her end of their deal. It would be better if it ended there.

The sun was fully risen now, its early light pale as it cast over the—what did Rouge call it—highway. It wasn’t quite gold as much as it was a sort of platinum color, like the shade his fur had turned when the strange gemstones had lent him their power. The sky was a canvas of watercolors. There was a clock on the car’s dashboard, telling him that it was nearly half-past-six.

“What am I supposed to do?” 

“Look out the window,” Rouge said. “Sleep. Go on your phone.” She snorted. “That was silly, you don’t even know how to work computers from thirty years ago, you certainly don’t have a phone .”

(Hey, if those computers had been from fifty years ago, they wouldn’t’ve known what hit ‘em! Maria joked.)

Rouge shifted lanes, and the car sped up, zooming by the truck they had been trailing behind. “Either way, car rides are often boring . Sorry, hun.”

Shadow could deal with boredom. He’d spent countless days in the tube after he’d arrived on Earth, awake and aware but unable to leave. Maria’s friendly interactions with him had convinced the Professor that he could be trusted not to kill any of them upon being released, and the discovery that his movement could generate Chaos Energy had been enough for it to become his normal.

Still, sometimes he would be put right back into the tube, whether it was because some scientists wanted to test something, or he’d gotten into a bit too much trouble, or someone had to be persuaded that they still had control over him. Maria had stayed with him often, but she couldn’t be there at all times, and so Shadow still had long periods where it had been nothing but him and his thoughts.

It was miserable, sure, but he knew how to deal with it.

(At least you’ve got stuff to look at, this time, Maria said.)

He supposed she was right. There wasn’t much, the highway set down into the ground with steep stone walls up to the actual roads above. Still, he could see trees and endless houses and buildings. There were brightly colored billboards and metal logo signs that stretched toward the sky. Their car flew down the highway, Rouge easily weaving between other vehicles, and Shadow found himself mesmerized by the mundanity of it all.

Was this what life was like for regular humans? All of the other drivers didn’t know that there were two aliens on the road with them. The day was young, so perhaps they were simply heading to work? Maybe one had to go to a store, another to school. They didn’t have to worry about being found by the government and gunned down—or worse, dragged back to the pod and placed into cryostasis. The Professor and his grandson were gone, Blue was gone, and there would be no one left in the universe who would care enough to get him out.

Shadow remembered what it was like, watching the pod gradually fill, banging on the glass and meeting the blank gaze of Captain Walters. The man had always been kind to him, in a way few of the soldiers had, and yet he had done nothing to help. 

(Too dangerous to be walking free, too valuable to destroy, Blue murmured in a voice that wasn’t quite his own.)

Too valuable to destroy? If they were never going to let Shadow out, then what was the point of holding onto him anyway? He thought he knew the answer. G.U.N. had wanted to keep him frozen—unable to age or change or live or die—until they had a way to control him. He was an endless font of Chaos Energy, after all; an eternal battery, something that could power the world and propel humanity forward, if only they could figure out how to harness it.

The thought made Shadow sick. He needed to find a way to get the cuff off, even if he didn’t actually remove it. If G.U.N. ever found him, he was not going to allow them to take him back. He would never go into the cryo-pod again, where all he would know was the endless agony of losing Maria and losing Blue and losing the only people who ever cared about you—

“Are you doing all right, hun?”

Shadow sucked in a breath and turned to Rouge, trying not to look as startled as he felt. Her brow was furrowed, attention clearly on him even as her gaze stayed firmly focused on the road.

“I’m fine,” Shadow said gruffly. His Chaos Energy had reacted to his emotions, it seemed, even though he hadn’t noticed it. His wrist burned where the cuff touched it, and he scratched at the edge of it. He wondered if the fur would be singed beneath. “I want to know how to get this off.”

“Forgot about that,” Rouge said. “Guess I was a bit frazzled as we made our escape. Is it too tight?”

He grit his teeth. “It causes pain. Do you know what it is?”

“Well, it looks like a Chaos Blocker,” Rouge replied. “Though certainly not a real one. There’s Chaos Energy in all living things, some more than others, and a Blocker is meant to keep those with an affinity for it from harnessing it. Clearly it’s a fake, though, or at least not one that’s working.”

“Oh,” Shadow said in a low voice, “It’s working.”

“Kid, I saw you use Chaos Energy with that thing on.” She sounded distinctly unimpressed. “Can’t do that if it was a real Blocker. Might be an inhibitor, though. I can understand it might feel similar if you’ve never experienced something like that before.”

Shadow extended his other wrist, gold band glinting in the pale morning light. “I know what inhibitors feel like,” he said. “This is no inhibitor.”

Rouge didn’t respond, but her grip on the wheel tightened, and the car sped up a bit. There was a tense quiet before she finally spoke again.

“Wonder where they got a real Chaos Blocker,” she said lightheartedly. “Those are, like, super illegal. They’re not made anymore, haven’t been for quite some time, and the ones that do exist are expensive, and even more rare. I’ve never even seen one in real life.”

“Until now,” Shadow said stubbornly.

“Until now,” she confirmed. “As it is, those lock on electronically and are meant to only come off with the key that they were manufactured with. I don’t have the right kind of tools to remove it.”

“I don’t want to remove it.” Shadow balled his hand into a fist as a quick surge of pain shot up his arm. He had dealt with worse. This was nothing. “I just want to know how to.”

Rouge hummed. “Well kid, if you figure it out, let me know.”

He appreciated her lack of questions, despite the fact that she clearly wanted to ask them.

Shadow let himself zone out, the steady thrum of the car and the rumble of the wheels against the pavement making it just a bit easier to ignore the ever-dwelling storm in his mind. Occasionally, Blue or Maria’s voices would point out things as they passed them.

(Wisconsin! Maria exclaimed as they soared past the state’s welcome sign. Grandfather got all his cranberries from here.)

(Looks the same as the other state did, Blue commented.)

(Yeah, Maria replied, They do that.)

Around midday, Rouge pulled them into the back of a lot. She unclipped her seatbelt and twisted back to grab her purse. “You want anything?” She asked.

Shadow glanced at the building in front of them. It was large and brick, a section in the front painted blue with the white text ‘Walmart’ laid over it. He had no idea what was inside, or what he could even ask her for.

(You’re hungry, Blue pointed out. Ask for food.)

“No,” he said instead.

Rouge shrugged. “All right.” She pushed open the door and stepped swiftly outside, turning back to him. “How do I look?”

Shadow didn’t really know what answer she wanted. “Fine,” he said. “Very… human.”

She grinned widely, teeth gleaming. “Exactly what I was going for. Sit tight, kid. I’ll be back in a flash.”

(Don’t leave, Maria said sternly. This is your best bet anyway.)

He listened to her. As Rouge disappeared into the rows of cars, Shadow stayed put firmly in his seat. There wasn’t anywhere he could go, anyway. He had to get to Blue’s family, and Rouge knew how to get him there. It was the middle of the day, and he didn’t want to risk any people or cameras seeing him that might alert G.U.N. as to his presence and continued survival. Every time a human came anywhere close to the car, Shadow ducked down as low as he could, pulling his quills back as well and counting in his head until he was sure they must be gone.

He wasn’t sure how long it went on for. Eventually, though, there was a soft click and the driver’s door opened, Rouge sliding back in. She set her purse and a few plastic bags into the back seat before passing him a water bottle.

“Always good to stay hydrated,” she said, opening a bottle of her own. Shadow mimed her movements, carefully breaking the seal and taking a sip. It was cold, but felt good on his throat. He twisted the cap back on, deciding it would be better to conserve it rather than down it in one go.

Rouge reached into the back and dug around in her bags before pulling out something else. She held it out to him. “Here,” she said. “To pass the time.”

It was a book. Shadow had seen books before, of course. Maria loved to read to him at night, and they had them for their lessons, and the Professor had a whole mini-library for himself. Still, he had never seen this title before. 

“What’s it about?” He couldn’t help but ask.

“Not sure,” Rouge replied. “I’ve never read it. Cashier said it was good, though.”

Shadow wasn’t sure who Cashier was, but he supposed that any entertainment was better than nothing. Still– “Thank you,” he said. “But I don’t have time to go on another mission in return for this.”

Rouge laughed. “Oh, don’t worry about it, honey. Keeping you out of that head of yours is payment enough.”

They got back onto the road, and Shadow let the hours slip by as he started on the book. Maria’s voice said the words in his mind, and he almost wished he didn’t need to have his eyes open to read it. If he closed them, perhaps he could pretend that he was in the blanket fort with his sister, pressed into her side as she steadily spun him a tale that lulled him to sleep.

His eyes burned, and he blinked quickly to get the feeling to go away. It was a different burn from that of his wrist, which caused his muscles to spasm with pain again. Shadow ignored Rouge’s unsubtle attempts to get him to talk about it and turned to the next chapter.

At one point, Shadow looked back up to find the world soaked in golden light, their car driving toward the setting sun.

It was beautiful, he thought. The gold was rich and bright, and coated everything he could see.

And yet, somehow, it paled in comparison to the golden glow of Blue as they soared over the Earth. Blue’s gold had been light and love and life, and it had reached into Shadow’s soul and dragged him up into its splendor. 

It was almost funny, the colors that the gemstones turned them. Shadow had been the platinum dawn, and Blue the golden dusk. A pale, tentative rise and a bold, brilliant fall. Blue left, and the world grew darker for it.

(I’m still here, Blue whispered. Can’t you feel it?)

Shadow’s fingers tightened around the book, and his chest ached, even as the cuff sat dormant. The words rang in his mind.

(I’m still here.)

(I’m still here.)

(Can’t you feel it?)

Blue’s hand circled around his heart, ghostly and faint and not real in the slightest, and Shadow closed his eyes.

Not in any way that matters.

Chapter Text

Civilization grew sparser the farther west they drove. The stars, on the other hand, grew more plentiful, and Shadow kept his gaze resolutely on the book. Rouge offered him a glowstick once night fell, and though it was dim, Shadow’s eyesight was good enough that he could make out the words in its low light.

The radio played soft instrumentals, slow strings and delicate piano. Shadow was fairly sure Rouge had picked the music, and was satisfied by her choice. It settled his nerves, helped him tame them whenever the cuff threatened another flare-up.

“How’s the story?” Rouge snapped him from his thoughts as he went to turn to the next chapter.

“It’s fine,” Shadow said. 

“Vague.” She reached over and whacked him lightly on the shoulder. “What’s it about?”

“The Earth is dying,” Shadow replied after a moment. “There’s this… parasite eating the Sun. The main character is an astronaut—a human one—who travels to another star system to try and find a cure to get rid of the parasite. While he’s there, he meets another— an alien, who is there to solve the same problem. They’re working on it together.”

“So it’s about a human and alien overcoming their differences to become friends,” Rouge said.

(Almost sounds familiar, Maria laughed.)

“In a way,” Shadow said. “It is… interesting.”

“What a compliment,” she snickered. “Good enough entertainment, though?”

“Yes. I’m… enjoying it.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear it, hun,” Rouge said. “Cashier said they’re coming out with a movie for it in a few years. Might be fun.”

Shadow wasn’t sure he’d be around to see whatever adaptation this book brought about, but he simply directed his attention back to the pages and continued reading.

There weren’t many other cars on the road. The silhouettes of trees were in the distance, but the ground was flat in most every direction. The time ticked on, and eventually Rouge said, “Okay, we’re stopping here for the night.”

They approached a small set of buildings emerging from the endless fields, the sign proclaiming it as Lewistown. Rouge had him stay in the car and strolled confidently into the lobby of the inn she’d chosen.

(Think of it like a sleepover, Maria suggested.)

Shadow had no plans to go to sleep.

(Party all night! Blue cheered.)

Shadow would lay down, stare at the ceiling, and wait until the sun rose.

(Boring, Blue said.)

Rouge appeared from the front of the inn and opened the back door of the car, pulling out her purse and the bags from her shopping trip.

“C’mon, kid,” she said, straightening up. “It’s not far.”

She led him past a row of doors to one that looked just like all of the other ones, an old turquoise color. A key slid into the lock, and after a moment of fiddling with it she managed to push it open. 

The room was rather simple. There were two beds with relatively clean sheets, old wallpaper peeling at the corners, and a gray carpet with half-a-dozen strange stains. A television was mounted to the wall, far more advanced than anything he and Maria had once used, and the lamps that Rouge flicked on emitted a low orange light.

She ushered him inside and closed the door behind them, locking it and then placing two more locks of her own on after she dug them out of her purse. She made sure the curtains were pulled tight over the window and then turned to Shadow.

“You can have that bed,” she said, waving toward the one farther from the door.

He bristled. “I’d rather have that one.” He nodded to the closer of the two.

She studied him for a long moment, eyes narrowed. He glared back, and eventually she snorted and said, “Fine by me. Keep an eye out for any intruders, will you?” 

Shadow nodded curtly, and she stepped past him to place her purse on the bed, the other bags set on a faded red armchair.

Rouge adjusted the gem at her throat. There was a flash of light, and her human form was gone, replaced by the bat-like alien one instead. Her true appearance, he supposed.

“I don’t know your routine,” Rouge said, “But I’m taking the bathroom first. Get comfortable, I suppose, but not too comfortable. We’ll leave early.”

She disappeared through the door on the other end of the room, and a few seconds later he could hear the tell-tale sound of running water. A shudder ran through him involuntarily. He had never liked the showers back in the laboratory. They were quick and aggressive and the water was always either freezing cold or scalding hot. There was no privacy to it, not like how Maria described, and always reminded him of being shoved back in the tube, when his lungs would protest the lack of air before managing to remember how to adjust.

(Stop thinking about that, Maria said.)

(We should watch something, Blue suggested. To take your mind off of it.)

There was a remote control on the side table that rested between the two beds. Shadow hesitated for a moment before reaching over and grabbing it. The buttons were generally confusing, but he understood the Power one well enough. He pressed it, and the television flicked on with a tiny click .

(Oh, the news, Blue said as the screen erupted with light. The most interesting form of media.)

He was being sarcastic. Shadow didn’t need to hear Maria’s giggle to know that.The news had been the only thing that the Professor had ever watched. Shadow hadn’t been allowed to, for reasons he didn’t care to recall, but Maria had insisted that there was nothing special about it.

(It’s just adults talking for hours about nothing, she groaned. Movies are way better.)

Shadow had no idea how to make the television show a movie, though, and he didn’t think Rouge would appreciate him breaking anything when they were only meant to stay for half of the night. The news stayed on, a low drone filling the room.

“-Searching for any information on the individuals suspected of stealing the Tiffany Yellow Diamond from its display in—”

(You’re famous! Blue exclaimed.)

“-believed to be a team of five or more who managed to commandeer the priceless—”

The image of the Diamond was on the screen, large and sparkling. The reporter continued on about its cherished and distinguished history , and Shadow’s gaze flicked to Rouge’s purse, where he could just barely see the jewel poking out from one of the pockets. It looked rather lackluster in the room’s dim orange light. 

“Oh, we’re on the news,” Rouge said. Shadow hadn’t even noticed her emerging from the bathroom. Her fur looked a bit damp, but she wrapped a towel over her head and stepped closer to him, eyes still on the screen. “They know anything?”

Shadow shook his head. “They’re looking for five or more people.”

Rouge barked out a laugh. “Guess it’s a good thing those idiots showed up, huh?” She propped herself on the other bed and said, “All right, your turn.”

Shadow raised an eyebrow. “My turn?”

“Go shower,” she said. “Or take a bath, if you really want, I won’t judge. Either way, you should get clean.”

(That sounds nice, Maria sighed.)

“I’m fine,” Shadow replied. He hadn’t done anything akin to bathing since escaping from Prison Island, other than perhaps stalking through the rain in Tokyo before G.U.N. managed to find him. He supposed channeling the gemstones’ power with Blue could count. It hadn’t necessarily made him clean, but for a moment it had made him pure. Every bit of wrong within him had been wiped away, burned away by Blue’s golden glow. 

Then, Blue had been gone, and Shadow had been blown to Earth, and those impurities fell right back into place, with no one left to help him be rid of them.

“Wasn’t really a suggestion, hun,” Rouge said. “You’re dirty . Sorry. Just how it is.” Her lips quirked. “Do you really want to be this much of a mess when you get back to your Blue’s family?”

(Ooh, she got you, Blue chuckled.)

He scowled. Rouge’s smile widened and she tossed him a towel. He snatched it out of the air, trudging toward the bathroom and ignoring her sound of amusement.

The mirror was foggy, steam still hanging near the ceiling. Shadow fiddled with the knobs until he managed to get the water to come out of the showerhead. A few more twists made it warmer. Shadow felt the water for a moment before the cuff sent a fresh wave of pain through his body. A growl thrummed in his throat and he pressed the knob farther, until the water was searing.

(Turn it down, Maria scolded.)

He ignored her, stripping off his gloves and kicking his shoes into a corner before stepping into the shower. The water burned, but Shadow bit down on the inside of his cheek and pushed through it, running cheap, gritty soap through his quills and over his fur. Dirt swirled down the drain, and his nerves buzzed into numbness as the heat clawed at his skin.

He wasn't sure how long he stood there, once the soap was washed away. The water turned clear, though, and the storm in his mind battered against his skull, and the ringing in his ears drowned out the sound of Maria and Blue’s voices.

A shot of pain ran up his arm, shocking him back to reality. Shadow swallowed, and his throat ached. Still in a bit of a haze, he reached forward and turned the water off. Despite the ache it brought, he allowed himself a quick surge of Chaos Energy, boosting his speed to shake off the water.

His hands twinged, and left streaks of blood mingling with the drops on the tile as he stepped from the shower. He must have dug his claws into his palms without even noticing.

Shadow pushed open the door a bit, poking his head out. “Do you have any bandages?” He asked Rouge.

Her gaze zipped from the television to him, and her brow furrowed. “Did something happen?” 

He frowned. “It’s a yes or no.”

(Be nice, Maria said.)

“Someone’s cranky,” Rouge muttered. “Yeah, I’ve got some.” She dug in her purse and tossed over a roll of white bandages. “Don’t use ‘em all.” Shadow inclined his head to her and closed the door.

He wrapped the bandages tightly around his hands, using his teeth to tear it clean from the roll. Though it made his fingers a bit stiff, Shadow pulled his gloves back on and shoved his feet into his shoes before leaving the bathroom.

Rouge offered him a small smile when he handed her back the bandages. “You look better,” she said. “Feel good?”

He nodded tightly.

She glanced at the bathroom, where steam still billowed out. “Maybe turn the fan on next time,” she said rather than asking about it. “What’d you need the bandages for?”

“Hurt my hand.” He grabbed the edge of his glove. The scientists always poked and prodded at his hands, just as much as they did anything else. Sometimes, they would take his gloves away to ‘study’ them, and he wouldn’t get them back until Maria sneaked off and stole them. Shadow didn’t remember anything about his time before Earth, but he knew that the gloves made the journey with him. He didn’t think they would offer him any answers, but he wanted to keep them close regardless.

Rouge’s fingers closed around his wrist, and she yelped as his Chaos Energy surged in response, shocking her. “Gaia, okay, sorry, kid. You could just tell me you hurt your hand and leave it at that, though. No reason to—to take off your gloves or anything.”

“Is there something… wrong with it?” He asked. He hadn’t thought about it, but he supposed that Blue and his brothers had worn gloves, too. Rouge did as well, though ones far sleeker than his own.

(Maybe we should get new gloves, Blue said. Spice things up a little. Do they have glove stores?)

“Not… necessarily,” she said. “I just don’t want you doing anything that would make you uncomfortable. Not if you don’t have to.”

“Why would it make me uncomfortable?”

Her forehead creased. “Well, I suppose it might not. It’s a cultural thing, you could say. The terrain on many planets is not as friendly as that of Earth, and a long time ago, gloves were commonly used to help protect from it. Eventually, they became a sort of way of life. A social norm. It’s different for everyone, of course, but usually they’re only taken off in front of loved ones. Family, close friends, lovers. People you really trust, you know?”

The only person Shadow had ever willingly taken his gloves off in front of was Maria. Granted it was because she was the one person he didn’t have to fear might take them away, but he was glad that, even accidentally, the sentiment of the act rang true.

“Okay,” he said, letting his finger fall. “Thank you.”

“‘Course, hun. Don’t worry about it.”

Shadow drifted over to the empty bed. Rouge was already settled into her own, boots set to the side and feet propped up on an extra pillow, a blanket laid over her lap as she tapped away on the same small device she’d used for the map.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Shadow pulled his own shoes off and set them on the ground, mirroring Rouge’s. He pushed back the comforter and tried to settle into place.

Shadow had never actually been in a bed before. Maria had certainly tried to convince the soldiers and scientists, often promising that he wouldn’t sleep there, they would just hang out, but it had been a harshly-drawn line that even her best sad face hadn’t been able to get past. The blanket fort had been the closest thing. 

(It was more comfortable than my bed, anyway, Maria insisted.)

“You want the TV on or off?” Rouge asked as she moved the blanket on her lap so that it covered the rest of her body.

(On! Blue exclaimed.)

“I don’t care.”

She hummed. “I’ll mute it. The light helps me fall asleep, but the sounds make it hard. You can turn it off once I’m out, if you want.”

The television screen changed from the news to a different image, the top corner seeming to flip through numbers. Eventually, Rouge seemed satisfied, setting the remote down on the table between them. She reached over and flicked a switch, and the lights in the room clicked off, leaving only the steady glow of the screen.

Silence fell over them. Shadow shifted a bit, pulling up the comforter as Rouge had done with her blanket. Something thrummed beneath the window, and through the curtains was the faintest yellow light from a streetlamp. His eyes flicked to the locks on the door, double-checking to make sure they were still set.

“How long have you been on Earth?”

Rouge’s voice was soft, but there wasn’t anything to interrupt other than his own thoughts.

My whole life, Shadow wanted to say, but that wasn’t quite true. For the entirety of the only part of his life that mattered, perhaps. “As long as I can remember,” he said instead.

“Huh,” Rouge said, and fell quiet.

(Your turn, Blue hissed. She asked a question, so now you get to.)

(That’s right , Maria agreed. It’s the rules.)

There weren’t really rules to what was going on, Shadow thought. Still– “How long have you been the ‘best jewel thief in the universe?’” 

Rouge chuckled. “Since I started stealing jewels.”

(I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: the coolest, Blue said.)

She was turned away from him, and so Shadow didn’t hold back the scowl that appeared on his face.

He was sure that she would leave it at that, but after another beat, she continued.

“My parents were jewel thieves, too,” she said softly. It was a stark change, and a shocking one at that. “When I was born, we were happy, for some time. Once they decided I was old enough to stay on my own, though, they started to go on trips. First it was a week, then two, then a month. They’d go to more remote planets, search for treasures that were nothing more than rumors.” She paused. “Then, one day, they left, and never came back. A letter arrived a few months later, something about how the law was after them and they couldn’t have me tying them down anymore. I never saw them again.”

Shadow’s heart pounded.

“For a year, I tried to fend for myself while staying on the straight-and-narrow. It made me angry, though, knowing that they were out there doing what they loved while I struggled to survive. So, I decided that if they wanted to leave me behind to go be jewel thieves, then I would become the best jewel thief there ever was. I would steal every gem I could find, and keep them all for myself, until they’d have no choice but to come crawling back and see everything that they decided to lose.” She huffed a laugh. “It started out of spite, but I grew to love it. I don’t know if they ever appreciated the jewels the way I do.”

“I hope they don’t,” Shadow found himself saying. “Makes it worth more to you than it is to them, then.”

“I suppose so.” 

Shadow’s gaze studied the ceiling. It was bumpy, almost like the popcorn that he and Maria would share during movie nights. Another jolt of pain shot out from the cuff, and he squeezed his eyes shut as his blood burned. For a moment, he thought he could feel Maria’s hands, gently soothing the ache in his limbs while Blue wrapped around Shadow’s heart as if he could protect him from the worst of it.

“I had a sister,” he said before he could stop himself.

The television buzzed, and the screen looked blurred. Shadow’s chest hurt.

“What was she like?” Rouge asked. 

He let out a shaky breath. Here, in this cheap room in a town nestled in the middle of nowhere, Shadow felt nearly as vulnerable as he had on the Moon with Blue, when their souls were laid bare.

“Her name was Maria,” he said. “She was human. The Professor’s granddaughter. None of— The others didn’t like me. They looked at me like I was—was something to be afraid of. Maria didn’t, though. She was kind. She called me her little brother. We would—We would watch movies, and pull pranks, and she taught me how to skate. She told me that—that the Earth was my home, and she— I believed her, when she said it. I really did.”

Rouge didn’t interrupt him. Neither did the voices in his head. He was grateful for it. He thought that if he stopped, he wouldn’t start again.

“It was so quick,” he murmured. He wasn’t even sure if it was audible. He didn’t care. “She was there, and then she was gone , and it was all I could see—all I could think about—for so long.” His heart ached. “She was all I had, for most of my life. Then I—I thought that maybe— Blue and I fought when we met. But then he— I hurt someone he cared about, and he spared me.” He swallowed. “I finally had someone else, someone who— But then he fell and I just— I let him die.”

There was an uneven pulsing behind his eyes, as if the headache couldn’t decide quite where it wanted to hurt.

“Did your Blue care about the people he loved?”

(Of course , Blue sang. More than anything.)

“More than anything,” Shadow echoed.

“Then he’d forgive you,” Rouge said simply. 

“What?” It was stupid for her to say that. She didn’t understand. Shadow had gotten Blue killed. “How can you say that?”

“Because you forgive the people that you care about,” Rouge explained. “And it’s like you said; more than anything, Blue cared about the people he loved.”

Shadow’s mouth was dry. He knew what she was implying, but he didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t want to believe it. Did that make it worse, the idea that Blue had loved him, in whatever way that was, and Shadow had let him die anyway?

(Not by choice, Blue said. You had to stop the Cannon. That saved my family. It’s okay.)

He did not need his conscience trying to absolve him of the guilt that he had rightfully earned.

Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes, and despite how he pushed them away, Maria and Blue’s hands circled around his heart and tried to force warmth back into his body.

He was yanked from his thoughts by the television’s sound returning. It was in the middle of a movie he’d never seen before, some sort of cartoon. Delicate music played as a scrawny boy held his hand out to a beast and turned his head, an overwhelming show of trust.

The volume was low, but it was enough that focusing on the movie might keep his roaring thoughts at bay.

“Good night, Shadow,” Rouge said. He hadn’t even noticed her move to grab the remote, and already she was turned back toward the wall.

He tangled his fingers in the comforter. “Good night, Rouge.”

On the screen, the beast pressed its snout into the boy’s hand. Their eyes met, and the moment was broken, but the world had shifted, and something between them remained changed regardless.

Chapter Text

“Did you sleep at all?” 

Shadow shook his head.

Rouge scoffed. “I can’t believe you’re awake right now.” She yawned, and the car jolted a bit.

He eyed the steering wheel carefully. “More so than you, it seems. Perhaps I should drive.”

She laughed. “No way, kid. You must be at least this tall to reach the pedals.”

Shadow was sure he could figure it out.

(I always said you were short! Maria giggled.)

(Don’t worry about it, Blue said. They’re just jealous that short people are cooler than them.)

The day was still young, the fields dim and the sky splashed with colors. Clouds were streaked with pale pinks and oranges, and the sun was threatening to emerge from the horizon behind them.

“Only a few hours from here,” Rouge said as they reached the city limits. “I’d get some rest if I were you.” Shadow pulled out the book she’d given him. “Or not. What do I know?”

It was easy to fall back into the lull of the car ride. Time slipped by and the sun peeked out over distant hills, painting the trees and grass with its platinum morning light. Maria’s voice read the book in his head, and Blue’s interjected with comments whenever anything vaguely interesting happened.

(They’ll blame her? Blue asked indignantly. One of the characters had just told the protagonist that she would be sent to jail if the Earth survived because of her efforts to help it. But she saved the world! They put her in charge of everything to save the world!)

(People wouldn’t like what she had to do, though, Maria pointed out.)

They always want a scapegoat, a monster that they can blame instead of themselves, Shadow thought viciously, and continued reading.

There were barely any cars on the road, now. Sometimes they would go ten minutes before seeing a single other vehicle, and the amount only lessened the farther they drove. It was strange, imagining that there were so many places with no one there. 

Shadow knew logically that there were. The facility had been in the mountains, with no civilization in sight. He’d been with Maria then, though. He’d always been around soldiers or scientists or ghosts. He wondered how long he could be out in these fields, alone, before G.U.N. found him. 

Perhaps that was why he noticed when the strange cars sidled up behind them.

Shadow had been frozen for fifty years, and a lot had changed in that time. Still, he had seen a lot of vehicles over the past few days, and none of them had looked like the ones that were trailing them now. Their shells were smooth and silvery, and they didn’t shake with the bumps in the road. He narrowed his eyes and watched through the mirror as they drove.

“I didn’t think Earth had hover cars, yet,” he finally said. His muscles twitched as a new round of pain ran up from the cuff.

Rouge furrowed her brow. “What? It doesn’t.”

He nodded toward the rear window. “Tell them that.”

Her gaze flicked to the mirror, and then she craned her neck to look behind them. Abruptly, she settled back into her seat, grip on the wheel tightening.

“What is it?” Shadow asked. “Who are they?”

“Trouble,” Rouge replied. “Another thing you should know, hun: being the best jewel thief in the universe doesn’t often result in the law being the happiest with you.”

He looked at the sleek cars behind them, a line of four that stretched down the road. “It’s law enforcement?” He asked. “From another planet?”

“So it seems,” Rouge said.

(That’s not fair! Blue exclaimed. We’re on Earth! They need, like, a warrant!)

Shadow didn’t think Blue knew what he was talking about, but the point stood. 

“Are they allowed to do that?” She gestured for him to go on. “Just— try to arrest someone on a different planet?”

“Generally, no,” Rouge replied. “But Earth isn’t in the Knowing Universe, so it’s fair game.”

“How did they find you?” Shadow asked.

“That’s what I’d like to know.”

The silence that followed was tense. Rouge was clearly wound up tight, her eyes darting between the mirrors and the empty road ahead. 

Eventually, she took a deep breath. “All right, kid,” she said. “Let’s see what we can do.”

The engine roared, and the car shuddered for a split-second before shooting forward, soaring down the highway. Lightning flickered over the vehicle that had been right behind them, and Shadow felt his own Chaos Energy tingle in response, the cuff burning as it did. The other car jerked, and then surged ahead of them.

Rouge growled and slammed on the brakes. The car skidded and barely managed to avoid falling into a ditch. “Stay here,” she said, reaching up to the jewel at her throat. There was a flash of light and her human form disappeared, replaced by her true one. She pushed open the door and stepped out onto the grass. Shadow ducked down, allowing himself the smallest area to see what was going on.

“Hello, there, Chief Avid,” she said, grinning sharply as an alien stepped out of one of the other cars. “You don’t think this is all a bit extensive?”

“Rouge the Bat,” the alien—Chief Avid—said. His voice was low, stripes like those of a tiger along the sides of his face. A shiny badge was pinned to his chest. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Oh, don’t pretend you weren’t looking for me.” She studied her nails, as if the conversation was boring her. The doors on the other cars opened as well, and more aliens with the same badge emerged. “Lying isn't very becoming of you.”

Chief Avid laughed. “You can believe whatever you’d like, Bat. We came looking for those troublemakers from the festival, but I suppose you’ll do.”

Rouge hummed. “Vice and his little sidekicks? Funny. I just saw him. I’d be happy to point you in their direction.”

“Believe it or not, they’re not of as much interest as you are. They’ll show their faces again, one way or another. They always do. You, on the other hand, tend to be much more… elusive.”

“I’m flattered,” Rouge said. “What makes you think that you can hold me, though? It hasn’t worked before.”

Chief Avid smiled widely. He had canines that glinted in the mid-morning light. “I know it’s different on your home planet, but on ours, you’re considered old enough for the fullest extent of punishment available. Local laws apply, as you well know. No more juvenile holding centers for you.”

(Wait, Blue said. How old is she? Did we ever figure that out?)

Rouge took a small step back. Her stance remained as confident as ever, but Shadow thought it might just be a facade, now. “Well, this all seems a tad unfair, Chief. Not even giving me a fighting chance?”

“We’ve learned our lessons about that one, Bat,” Avid replied.

(Help her, Maria murmured. You can. Help her.)

Rouge had told Shadow to stay hidden, but he didn’t think that mattered now. There was no way she could beat the number of officers that were out there, even with the skills she clearly had.

Shadow, though…

His seatbelt was long since abandoned. Shadow shifted his legs so that he was crouching in the seat, the open driver’s side door staring mockingly at him. He shoved past the Blocker’s power again and reached for his Chaos Energy. It responded eagerly, and he shook out his quills to let it bounce between them.

(In, Maria said.)

Shadow took in a long, slow breath.

(Out.)

He exhaled.

(Go, Blue whispered.)

He went.

In a flash, Shadow was next to one of the officers. He kicked the alien’s head, and then flashed to another. Yelling erupted around him, and he did his best to stay focused, ignoring the escalating pain in his body as the Chaos Blocker fought against every move he made.

Finally, he appeared behind the Chief, knocking him down and standing over him. 

“What the— Who are you?”

Shadow’s hands balled into fists and he glared down at the man. Chaos Energy rolled over his body. The gemstones in his pocket burned, and he felt a surge of strength, as if they were lending him a bit of their power. “This planet is not open to visitors. Leave.”

Avid sputtered. “This—This isn’t a part of the Knowing Universe!”

Clouds gathered above, dark and swirling, reacting to the gemstones’ power, even as they stayed firmly separated from him. Red lightning flickered at the edges of his vision, and he felt the Energy flare in his eyes. He wondered what he looked like to the Chief. He wondered if he looked like a monster. “I don’t care,” he said. “The Earth is off-limits.”

The Chief’s head swiveled around quickly, gaze landing on his officers that all struggled to get to their feet. He looked back up at Shadow and said, “Yes, of course. Off-limits. Got it.”

He stood guard as the aliens staggered through portal rings, the vehicles following on their own. Shadow didn’t let his Chaos Energy recede even as the portal closed, skid marks being the only remaining proof of what had happened. 

“Nice job, kid,” Rouge said, and her voice managed to pull him from the depths of his mind. He let out a shaky breath and relinquished his hold on the Energy. The Blockers pushed forward and slammed down on it, rocking him with a burst of pain intense enough to have him double over. 

He waited for the burning to fade, breathing slowly in through his nose and out through his mouth, just like Maria had taught him a lifetime ago.

“Are you okay?” Rouge’s words were tinged with concern. He swallowed and tasted ash, electricity zipping down his throat.

“I’m fine,” Shadow said. Overhead, the clouds began to dissipate.

She hummed. “That was pretty intense. Didn’t know you knew how to do that.”

(‘Knew’ is a strong word, Maria muttered.)

Shadow shrugged. “Do you think they’ll come back?”

“Them specifically? No,” Rouge said. “You scared ‘em off good, hun. Thing is, it’s not them coming back that I’m worried about.” He made a questioning noise, and she continued. “Rings can’t just go anywhere. Whoever is using them either has to have a specific location in mind, or they need to be able to picture where they want the other side to open up. Either way, they couldn’t have simply opened a portal to wherever I am. They had to have known, and they had to have had a way to know.”

It took him only a moment. “A tracker,” he said.

She nodded. “I’m not sure exactly where, but I need to both find it and disable it. Preferably sooner rather than later. Avid and his men were not the last ones I had a tussle with, meaning that it’s not their tracker; it’s someone else’s, and if they can use it—”

“-Anyone can,” he finished.

“Exactly.” Rouge sighed and adjusted her gloves, smoothing out a crease in one of them. “All right,” she said. “Let’s go. We’re almost there.”

The gemstones had settled back into their normal warmth, and the jolts of pain from the cuff  became more manageable, though the ache in his bones persisted. Shadow pulled himself back into the car, Rouge sliding in behind the wheel, and they took off down the highway again.

His book lay abandoned on the seat next to him, a slip of paper marking where he’d left off. Rather than reading on, though, Shadow set his sights on the limitless fields that he could see through the window. Every time he blinked, sparks danced behind his eyes, along with the image of himself, shrouded in darkness as Chaos Energy flickered over his spines. His gaze glowed red, and Shadow thought that the creature dwelling beneath his skin was a far scarier monster than anything the imagination could ever dream up.

(You are not a monster, Maria said firmly.)

(Yeah! If you are, what does that make me? Blue asked.)

Dead, Shadow thought bitterly, and their voices fell silent.

The minutes slipped by. Fields turned to forests turned to mountains, and eventually Rouge said, “Okay. We’re here.”

Shadow blinked, and saw the sign from Blue’s memory staring back at him: Welcome to Green Hills: The Little Town with a Big Heart. Rouge pulled off of the road, stopping next to an outcropping of rocks.

“What’s happening?” He asked.

She sighed, her shoulders heaving with the motion. There was a moment where she stared off at the sun, staying quiet. Then- “This is where we split up.”

Shadow’s fingers tightened around the edge of the seat. “What?”

“To be fair, this was our deal,” she said weakly. “You help me steal the Tiffany Diamond, I get you to this town. Here we are. Another few miles down this road and you’ll be smack in the middle of it.”

It was their deal. He knew that. Still, he had thought…

“I wanted to go with you,” Rouge continued. “ I planned to. For what it’s worth. But there— Things have changed.”

“The tracker,” he said, and she nodded.

“The longer that we’re together, and the longer that I’m not moving, the better chance someone has of finding both of us. I need to find that thing, disable it, and throw it in the ocean. You need to find your Blue’s family.”

It was true. The gemstones were warm. Guilt weighed heavy on his heart. He needed to say he was sorry.

“Thank you,” Shadow said. His voice was a bit rough. “For—For everything. I know that it was because of the deal, but—”

“Don’t worry, hun,” Rouge interrupted him easily. She smiled, as soft as he’d ever seen from her. “I get it.” She reached back and pulled a small box out of one of the plastic bags, passing it over to him. “Here. For you.” He hesitated, and she rolled her eyes. “A gift.”

Shadow didn’t recognize the insignia on the side. “What is it?”

“A phone,” Rouge replied, picking up her thin, screened device from the cupholder and waving it between her fingers. “My number’s in there, so you can call me or text me whenever.” She winked at him. “Like to tell me what you think of that book when you finish it.”

Shadow stared down at the little box. He didn’t know how to work one of these phones , which seemed to be drastically different from the ones he was familiar with, but he was sure he could figure it out. “Thank you,” he said again.

“No problem,” she said. “It’s just as much for me as it is for you. It might be the life I signed up for, but it can get… lonely, doing the things I do. It’d be nice to hear from you every once in a while, you know?”

He didn’t reply, but he thought that she understood. Perhaps she understood better than he’d ever imagined she would.

Rouge pushed open her door and appeared at his own. She grabbed the handle and pulled it open for him, and Shadow hopped onto the ground, the box still in his hand. There was a small flash of light as Rouge reached past him, her human disguise vanishing. 

She grabbed the book off of his seat and dropped it into his arms. “Can’t forget this.”

His heart pounded. For a moment, he wanted nothing more than to scramble into the comfortable familiarity of the rented car and tell her to drive off in any direction, until the idea of facing Blue’s family was nothing more than a distant fantasy.

(You have to do it, Maria murmured after being surprisingly quiet for so long. You know you do.)

He did. Every part of his being, aching limbs and burning muscles and tightened soul, knew that he had to. He wanted to, in a strange way. He owed it to Blue to finish this, just as he had thought he owed it to Maria to destroy the world. He would go to Blue’s family, and he would tell them that he was sorry. Perhaps it would be the last thing he would do, but he would do it regardless.

(Don’t think like that, Blue scolded.)

Rouge stood in front of him. She was just a bit taller than him, but it wasn’t helped by the heels on her boots. She stared down at him, something indescribable in her eyes, before she reached forward and smoothed back the quills at the front of his head. Despite the shiver it sent down his spine, he let her.

“Good luck, hun,” she said, and pressed her lips to his forehead. It was the same spot Maria had always kissed, when he went off for another test, or when he was too sore to move, or when she was wishing him goodnight. Something settled within him, and he closed his eyes, and for a moment it was his sister there instead.

The moment broke, and Rouge backed away. She glanced at the screen of her device—her phone—and huffed. “Just about ten in the morning,” she said. “You gonna be okay?”

He nodded. The spot on his forehead still tingled, and Maria was close, hovering just behind his thoughts.

Rouge grinned. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

Shadow took in a deep breath and, ignoring the pain from the Blocker, forced through a wave of Chaos Energy, tightening his grip on the box and the book as he did. His air shoes responded immediately, and he pushed off from the ground, running off toward the treeline and leaving Rouge in the dust. 

Though his chest hurt, he didn’t look back once.

Shadow crested a mountain as the sun truly began to claw its way up through the sky. Behind delicate clouds, it was a steady blue, and Shadow thought it might be the second most beautiful shade of that color he’d ever seen.

(I’m blushing, Blue teased.)

The town in the valley below looked picturesque, like something straight out of one of the books Maria would read to help him sleep at night when the days became too much. There were quiet houses spread over hills with a small downtown in the center. The edges of a lake were visible in the distance, light shining off of its surface.

(Home, Blue whispered, hands circled around Shadow’s heart. We’re home.)

Somewhere down in the valley, Blue’s family lived. Somewhere down in the valley, Blue’s family mourned, and here Shadow was, coming to disrupt whatever peace they might have managed to find. 

A monster on a screen, charging in to destroy lives, because it was the only thing that it knew how to do.

Well, it was still morning, and he still needed to figure out where , exactly, they lived. Shadow tried to think back, but there had been no information from Blue that he could discern, emotions having been far more prevalent. Director Rockwell, near the crater that he had made when he crashed back into the Earth, had spoken of the Wachowskis. That was Blue’s family, he was sure of it.

Something that the Professor’s grandson had said tickled at his brain next. Sheriff Goody-Goody, he’d mocked, speaking of Blue’s Tom. It wasn’t much, but perhaps it was enough. 

Shadow wasn’t too keen on immediately engaging with the law enforcement of any town. On the other hand, he really couldn’t afford to spend all day simply wandering around trying to figure out where Blue’s family lived, especially when anyone could see him while he did.

(Don’t be a scaredy-cat, Maria teased. You’re the Ultimate Lifeform, aren’t you?)

Shadow had never liked being called that, but Maria thought it was funny. 

Zipping down into the main part of the town, Shadow immediately began looking for the Sheriff’s Department. It wasn't difficult to find, nestled right on one of the few main roads. Though his mind buzzed to stay clear of it , he squared his shoulders and approached with as much confidence as he could muster, trying to channel every bit of Rouge that he could.

Off-key whistling greeted him as he entered.

“Oh, finally! ” A man’s head popped up from behind a desk before abruptly disappearing, replaced by the clattering of objects across the floor. “Oh, come on.” The man reappeared, a wide grin on his face that faltered when he registered Shadow’s presence. “You’re not the donut guy,” he said dejectedly, and Shadow raised an eyebrow at his priorities.

“I’m looking for the Wachowski residence,” he said. 

“Oh, yeah, for sure, little dude,” the man said. He rounded his desk and held out a hand. “I’m Wade, by the way. Wade Whipple. Protector of Green Hills and also sometimes the Master Emerald.”

Shadow shook the hand once and then dropped it. He did not offer his own name, and Wade quickly looked too uncomfortable to ask.

“So, are you, like, friends with the kids?”

Shadow assumed he was talking about Blue and his brothers. He didn’t know the yellow or the red one at all, and he barely spent any time with Blue. Despite that, though, he thought that he might know Blue as intimately as he knew himself. For a far-too-short amount of far-too-glorious time, their hearts had beat in tandem, and their souls had sung in harmony.

(Yeah, Blue breathed. ‘Friends’ feels too light a word.)

Shadow agreed, but this human wouldn’t understand. Instead, he said in a low voice, “Something like that.”

“Yeah, okay, cool,” Wade said. “You definitely look like it.” His smile was lopsided, and Shadow thought his life might have been a lot easier if all of the G.U.N. soldiers had been like this man instead. “It’s, uh, 55 Plymouth Road. Just, like, a right, and then a left, and then another right, and then another right at the second stop sign—” He paused and counted off on his fingers. “Wait, I mean your right. Or maybe it’s mine. Give me a second.”

“Don’t bother,” Shadow interrupted, taking pity on the man. “I can find it.”

“Oh, great,” Wade sighed. “I did not want to have to get the map out for that. I’d owe Tom five dollars. You know, the last time something like this—”

Shadow thought if he spent any more time in this man’s vicinity, his head might explode. He turned sharply on his heel and walked away. As the door closed behind him, Wade was still talking.

Quickly making his way to the outskirts of the town, Shadow darted to every street sign that he could find. He ducked away whenever he heard a car rumbling along the road. One person seeing him was enough already. Each one was an uncontrollable risk. He didn’t need any more, especially when he was so close.

Finally, after what felt like far too long, he found the correct street. The mailboxes were labeled with the addresses, which at least made that part easier.

As he closed in on what must be 55 Plymouth Road, Shadow’s steps grew slower. He stayed along the underbrush, heartbeat sneaking up into his throat.

(Don’t be scared, Blue said. It’s just my family, dude.)

(It’s okay to be nervous, Maria assured him. As long as you remember that you’re brave enough to do it anyway )

That was the thing: Shadow wasn’t sure he was brave enough. He hadn’t felt nervous in quite a long time. Angry? Always. Scared? Of course. Pain? He no longer remembered living without. But nervous? He couldn’t even think of the last time.

(I’m right here, Maria murmured. We’re right here. Her hands and Blue’s hands cupped his heart as one, and Shadow tried his very best to grasp onto the faint warmth that it brought him. Just breathe.)

Shadow had stood on the steps up to 55 Plymouth Road for a good while now, and only just began to register the barking of the dog in the window. It was processed just a moment too late, as the front door suddenly opened and a human woman—Blue’s human woman—said, “See, Ozzie? There’s nothing—” Her words cut off as her gaze landed on him. Her eyes widened, and she took a small step back. “You.” Shadow couldn’t quite discern the emotion in her voice, but he wasn’t sure he liked it.

“Hello,” he said, and did his best not to scuff at the wood underfoot. The box and book were heavy in his grasp.

“You’re alive,” she said. They’d never met properly, only a glimpse in passing and then what feelings of love Blue managed to pass on, but he still felt a measure of shame as she stared down at him.

“Yes,” he said. “I wanted to— I have to apologize, and to offer my—my condolences—” He choked on his words.

(It’s all right, Blue said, suddenly gentle. She gets it.)

“Tom’s alive.” Her words were sharp. “It was— not great, but he’ll survive.”

It didn’t lift all the weight from his chest, but it was better than nothing. That was only one death from this family resting on his shoulders, then.

(Please, Blue laughed, I’m not on your shoulders. You skate too much, I’d fall right off.)

Shadow swallowed. “Good,” he said. “That’s— good.”

She hummed. “Everyone else is out of the house. Hospital. You know.”

Shadow had never been to a hospital, so he really didn’t know, but he nodded anyway. “Sorry,” he said. 

The woman stared at him for a long moment. Then, she sighed. “You should come in.”

Shadow shook his head immediately. “No, ma’am, I shouldn’t.”

Her nose scrunched. “Call me Maddie. And I insist. Sonic’s been worried.”

Shadow had no idea which one ‘Sonic’ was, or why they’d be worried. Still, he took a step back. “No, Maddie, ma’am. I’m fine. Thank you for offering.”

(She’s trying to be nice to you, Maria admonished. You should let her.)

No, Shadow should not . He almost killed her husband, and he let her son die. It was already pushing it, getting any amount of forgiveness for the first part. If she knew about the second…

“Come back, at least,” Maddie said, and her voice left little room for argument. “I mean it.”

A monster sat under his skin, and the cuff bit at his blood trying to seal it away. He gave her a single nod. “Very well.” He had little intention of following through. As he sped off, he wondered if she knew that.

(You should go back, Maria said. At least have a real talk.)

No, frankly, Shadow didn’t think he should. He had done what he needed to. The apology was over, and the Tom was fine, and he didn’t think he could spend one more second around anyone who had gotten the proper chance to experience Blue’s love, which still dwelled solidly in his heart.

(You’ve gotta go back, Blue tittered.)

Shadow very much did not.

(You’ve still got the gemstones, Blue said gleefully. Those don’t belong to you.)

Shadow’s hand shot up to the pocket of the jacket, where he could feel the pulsating power of the gemstones through the leather. He groaned. 

(In the back of his mind, Blue cackled, and Maria giggled right along with him.)

Chapter Text

The forest had paths with sharp turns and scorch marks along the dirt. Small wooden ramps and hoops nailed to trees dotted the trails. Shadow’s throat hurt as he walked along them.

(Looks like fun, Maria said.)

(Oh, it is, Blue replied.)

Shadow was reminded of those flashes of excitement again, of running and sliding and laughing. His hand dragged over the slightly-rusted metal of one of the hoops, and it shook just a bit under his touch.

(We should race someday, Blue said eagerly. Find out who’s actually faster.)

Shadow ripped his hand from the metal as if it had burned him. Pain erupted from the cuff at his wrist. He ignored Blue’s words ringing in his mind and continued to move through the forest.

There were foxholes and hollowed-out trees and burrows that he could probably curl up in until tomorrow if he really had to, but Shadow had little desire to do so if he could avoid it.

Once the sun was nearly directly overhead, an easy sign of midday, Shadow finally stumbled across something that actually looked promising. It was a small opening, but beyond it seemed to be a larger cavern, one that could comfortably fit and conceal him.

He slipped inside, and felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him.

He was not the first one here.

There was furniture spread throughout, road signs along the walls and clutter in the corners. A decent layer of dust was along many of the items, but this place was lived in, even if it hadn’t been for some time.

He drifted toward the wall, brushing aside some overgrowth to reveal a crude drawing beneath. It looked at first to be of two animals: the larger holding a flower, the smaller one sitting beside them. After a moment, though, he realized what he was truly looking at. It was Blue . He must have been young, both in the image and when he created it. 

Shadow’s fingers brushed over the other creature in the drawing, what appeared to be an owl.

“Is this…”

(Longclaw, Blue breathed reverently.)

The owl with the spread wings and gentle smile appeared in his mind. This was Blue’s Longclaw, the one that he had lost. His Maria, or the closest he had. 

This was Blue’s cave, then. Shadow was a bit confused, because it didn’t really look like a place to hangout. His and Maria’s blanket fort had been, somewhere that they could spend time and maybe fall asleep, but also somewhere that they knew wasn’t where they actually stayed, no matter how much Shadow wished that it was. 

This cave, though, seemed to be far more than that.

Shadow had assumed that Blue had lived with his family—the Wachowskis—for all of the time that he had been on Earth. It had been the easiest way to believe that they’d differed. Shadow had been found by the government, Blue had been found by a family.

To think that he had been alone too? It was strange. Shadow wasn’t quite sure what to make of it.

Still, whatever time Blue had spent here was over, one way or another. Shadow felt no small amount of guilt at the thought of staying somewhere that must have once been a safe place for Blue, especially after he’d led him to his death. As it was, he hoped that Blue would find it within himself to forgive him.

(Oh, shut up, dude, of course I will, Blue snorted. I’m cool like that.)

(You’re trying your best, Shadow, Maria added. It’s okay to forgive yourself, too.)

Shadow, once more, was quite sure that Maria didn’t know what she was talking about. He ignored her in favor of approaching the red lump on the ground. He bent down and poked it, and then rubbed the fabric between his fingers, trying to feel its insides. It felt like foam pellets, but shaped strangely, almost like—

“Beans?”

(Duh, Blue said. I did say you needed a beanbag and some comic books, didn’t I?)

Shadow knew comic books, because Maria had a few that she’d liked, even if she wasn’t overall a very big fan. Beanbags, though, were not something that the laboratory’s residents were privy to. Shadow poked at it a few more times before Blue’s prodding convinced him to sit down.

It wasn’t the most comfortable thing in the world, but Shadow didn’t think anything would ever measure up to the blanket fort. As it was, it was better than the tube, and he’d spent more time in there than he wished to remember.

Exhaustion clung to his bones, abruptly present as he leaned back. Being knocked unconscious by the Eclipse Cannon exploding and then waking up hurtling toward Earth’s surface did not result in the nicest sleep, and before that it had been in the cryostasis pod. Shadow hadn’t realized he was this tired until he slumped into this beanbag chair, but now his eyes ached to close. He set the phone box and the book carefully on the ground next to him. His muscles spasmed as another jolt of pain ran through his body, the Chaos Blocker showing no mercy even now.

(Sleep, Shadow , Maria said gently. It’ll be all right.)

He wished that she was really here, to run her fingers through his quills and draw circles into his fur and hold him close as the lights in the facility dimmed. He even wished that Rouge was here, with a gleaming smile and knowing eyes as a television buzzed in the background and a cheap comforter wrapped over his shoulders. Instead, a small draft blew through the cave, and Shadow tried to focus on the warmth of the strange gemstones to keep himself from shivering.

Despite how his thoughts raced and his heart ached, he found sleep.

“So if you hold down these three, it’s a G chord,” Maria explained. Shadow leaned closer, peering at her fingers. “And these two make an E minor chord.”

“And you use all of the strings for those ones?”

“Exactly!” She shifted her fingers again. “If you wanna do a C chord, though, then you only strum the bottom five. Like this—”

The doors burst open. The Professor stood there, harried, his eyes wide as he said sternly, “Kids. We have to go.” Shadow and Maria stared at him. “Now!”

They ran through the corridors. Shadow could go faster than either of them, but he wouldn’t leave them behind. He couldn’t. He took Maria’s hand in his own and they headed toward the entrance, toward a door he had never been allowed through. Footsteps followed behind them, a cacophony, and Shadow tried to tune out the alarms that echoed through the facility.

“They want to take Shadow away from us, Maria!” The Professor exclaimed as they entered the front room. Shadow met his sister’s eyes, fear flashing through them, and they moved just a bit quicker. The exit was ahead of them, the starry sky beyond, with those diamonds that might still be shining even after they were gone.

A scuffle arose behind them, unintelligible yelling followed by a single shot. Any other sounds faded away, and all Shadow could hear was the sharp breaking of glass, a slow crack, and a deafening explosion.

The stored Chaos Energy reacted violently as it was freed, and Shadow felt searing heat against his fur. Maria’s hand slipped from his, and the world went dark.

His ears were ringing. His head was pounding. Shadow sat up, disoriented.

Maria was on the ground.

He ran over to her, sliding up to her side. Her eyes were closed, like she was asleep. Soot clung to her dress, to her hair, to her skin.

“Maria?” He asked, shaking her a bit.

The Professor was on her other side, and when Shadow met his eyes, they were filled with tears, his face blotchy as streaks ran through ash.

Shadow’s breath caught in his throat. He looked down at Maria frantically. She didn’t move. His eyes burned, and his shoulders heaved. He didn’t know what to do. Shadow was supposed to fix things—that was what he was for—and he had no idea how to fix this.

“You can’t.”

He whirled around. Maria stood in front of him, silhouetted by the raging flames behind her. The Professor was gone, as were the soldiers, as was her body.

“What?” He rasped.

She cocked her head to the side. 

“Don’t be surprised, Shadow,” she said, and the kindness in her voice made his insides squirm. “You know as well as anyone that monsters can’t fix things.”

Fire climbed up her legs, her arms, her clothes. It licked at her face, and her eyes glowed in the light.

“Maria!” He cried. He attempted to move forward, but his body was locked into place. His heart pounded, blood rushed past his ears, and the cuff around his wrist tightened.

His legs were freed, and he stumbled back. Debris dug into his palms, Maria’s face burned in his mind, and he closed his eyes, pressed his forehead to the ground, and screamed until every other sound was drowned out.

“Shadow?”

He inhaled sharply. It was dark around him, the air choked with smoke, the flames a distant haze. Maria was gone, but Shadow could barely even think of that. A shock ran through his heart as he raised his gaze and met emerald. Blue .

The other’s body flickered between cobalt and gold. His eyes were bright, just as Shadow remembered them. His mouth was screwed up in pain, and he staggered forward.

“Blue.” Shadow tried to move toward him, but Blue didn’t react. Those bright eyes looked right past him, and Shadow’s blood turned to ice. There was something behind him, something dangerous, and he wasn’t sure whose will it was that made him turn around.

In the darkness, lightning flickered over a shrouded form. Red eyes flared.

It was him. Shadow stared back at himself, and Blue took a shuffling step closer.

“Shadow?” He asked, his words coated in desperation and relief. “You’re here. Thank God you’re here. I—”

The copy of Shadow shot forward, and his fist punched clean through Blue’s chest. The other didn’t even shout, he just crumpled to the ground, a pained whine escaping his throat. His stuttering heartbeat, growing ever slower, was louder than the sound of the roaring flames. The gold flickering stopped, and he was as azure and mortal as ever.

His copy turned to him, eyes like rubies, like the shimmering pool of blood steadily growing around Blue’s trembling form. Chaos Energy churned around him, and the cuff at his wrist sent a wave of agony coursing through his limbs.

“This is what you are,” the copy said. “This has always been what you are.”

He disappeared in a flash, and Shadow could move again. He scrambled to Blue’s side, pulse hammering in his ears. 

There wasn’t anything he could think of to do. Shadow wasn’t trained in anything medical. He wasn’t meant to be a healer of people, he was meant to be a healer of the world. He would be the energy source that propelled humanity into the future, there was no reason for him to know how to help someone who was hurt.

“I don’t— What do I do?” He muttered to himself. “I don’t know what to do!”

“Haven’t you done enough?” Blue’s voice was quiet, but not in the way that it had been on the surface of the Moon, when his soul had whispered secrets where only Shadow and the stars could hear them. Rather, it was strangled, as if every word was an effort.

“I’m trying to help you,” Shadow hissed. It sounded strained.

“Just like you helped me stop the Cannon?” Blue asked. Shadow froze. “And then let me fall. You could have saved me.”

“I—” He swallowed, hard. “I had to—to move it out of the way. We— It would have destroyed the world.”

“How is it fair,” Blue continued as if he hadn’t heard him, “That I do everything I can to save the Earth, and you bring about its doom, and yet I’m gone, and you’re still here?” His green eyes were blown open, glowing wildly. Scarlet tears fell down his face, staining his fur red. There was a hole in his chest, and a heart desperately trying to beat on within. “You’re still here, when there’s not even anyone left to mourn you.”

Shadow grit his teeth. His soul screamed, rattling in his ribcage as if its suffering would be enough for it to break free. “I’m sorry,” he managed to say. “If I could— I’d do it all again, I’d go after you, I—”

“Liar,” Blue breathed. He grinned with blood-stained teeth. “You couldn’t save her, and you couldn’t save me. Face it, Shadow: Monsters don’t get happy endings.” He laughed, high and manic, as his bones crumbled under Shadow’s touch and his eyes glowed even brighter. “And God help any of us who are caught in the crossfire.”

He woke with a stuttering gasp. His face was wet. His heart was pounding. He was alone.

Shadow closed his eyes for a moment, trying to let his pulse settle back into something more uniform. 

Maria was gone. Blue was gone. Both of them were gone.

(And it’s not your fault, Maria said.)

She always had been too kind to him. Both of them had. Shadow hadn’t deserved Blue’s forgiveness, just as he didn’t deserve Maria’s now.

His eyes shot open. The light through the hole above was pale, indicative of morning, but it was not the sun that truly roused him. Rather, it was the steady whirring that appeared just a few yards away.

Immediately, Shadow leapt to his feet, Chaos Energy gathering in his hand even as the cuff sent a shock of pain through him. If G.U.N. was here, they were going to have a hell of a fight trying to get him back.

(Shadow, Maria warned, It’s-)

(My brother! Blue cheered.)

The yellow alien was at the entrance to the cave, staring at him with wide eyes. “You’re alive,” he squeaked.

“Sorry to disappoint you,” Shadow managed to say, forcing the Chaos Energy back down. “Did your— Maddie not tell you?”

“She did,” the alien said slowly. “I just…”

“Didn’t believe her,” Shadow finished, and got a sheepish nod in return.

“I mean, it’s crazy, isn’t it?” The alien asked. “Falling to Earth and surviving? That doesn’t—That doesn’t happen.”

The voice was young, and it was strained , and Shadow wondered if he should apologize for surviving the fall when the alien’s brother didn’t.

(He doesn’t wanna hear that, Blue said.)

Shadow stayed silent.

“Why are you— What are you doing here?” The yellow alien finally asked.

“Apologizing,” Shadow said gruffly.

“Yeah, Mom— Uh, Maddie said you did that. But, I mean, why are you still here?”

(Because Mom invited you and you don’t wanna make her sad, Blue laughed.)

“She asked me to come back,” Shadow replied. “It’d be rude. To not.”

The yellow alien wrung his hands together for a moment. He took out a device, reading something off of the screen and pointedly ignoring Shadow even as he bristled. Then, the alien sighed, put the device away, and looked up at him. “Look, you—you hurt my dad. You hurt my family. And that’s not okay. But you—you also have been hurting, right? And you did the right thing in the end. We’ve all got experience with that, some more than others.” He cracked a smile. “I think it’d be nice to start over. If you’d like.”

Shadow wasn’t quite sure what starting over entailed.

(Oh, just do it , Maria said. What’s the worst that could happen?)

Shadow had already experienced the worst that could happen. His skin had been peeled back and his heart had been broken and his soul had been torn in two. Still, the yellow alien looked unbearably hopeful, and he could distantly feel Blue’s love for him fluttering in his chest. “Fine,” he said.

“Great!” The yellow alien exclaimed, smile expanding. He leaped forward, dual tails spinning to propel him until he touched down in front of Shadow. “I’m Miles Wachowski,” he said, holding out a little hand. “But everyone calls me Tails.”

“Wonder why,” Shadow said, but he took the hand. “I’m Shadow. Just Shadow.”

“You got it, Just-Shadow,” Tails said easily. 

“Did anyone else follow you here?” Shadow asked.

“No, everyone else is out,” Tails replied. “Hospital. Dad—Tom—should get out soon, but Sonic’s still gonna be in for a while. Mom wants at least one person at home at all times, with everything that’s happened.”

Shadow still had no idea who ‘Sonic’ was, and so far both Maddie and Tails had spoken as if he should. 

(Just ask, Maria suggested.)

Shadow would rather die. Instead of asking anything, he simply raised an eyebrow. “You don’t seem very at home.”

Tails laughed awkwardly and tugged at a tuft of fur swept into his hands. “Yeah, well, I just… I saw some weird Chaos Energy readings, and I didn’t— I wanted to know what it was, because half the time with us it’s bad, and then I saw that it was here, and I didn’t wanna wait for everyone to get home, and—” He shrugged.

“You should head back,” Shadow said. “You wouldn’t want your mother to be worried.”

Tails huffed. “No one’s any fun,” he said. Still, he took a few steps back. “Mom really does want you to come back. I think everyone does. You won’t be kicked out, at least.”

Reassuring, Shadow wanted to say. He didn’t think Tails would appreciate that, though. Instead, he simply nodded. The little alien stared at him for a long moment before his tails began to spin around one another, pulling him up into the air. Tails hovered out of the exit and shot off into the forest, and Shadow allowed himself a breath of relief.

(See, that wasn’t so bad, Blue teased.)

(You did great, Maria said.)

Shadow didn’t really agree with either of them, but he also didn’t feel like arguing with the voices in his head. A surge of pain erupted from the Chaos Blocker, and he clenched his fists until it faded. The gemstones, still in his pocket, pulsated with heat, as if they wanted to remind him that they were there. 

He would bring those with him when he did finally return to the Wachowskis’ house. He would hand them off to Blue’s family, and he would give his final apologies and final goodbyes, and he would leave them be. No matter what sort of kindness they showed him, it wouldn’t change the fact that he’d left Blue to die. Even if they could forgive him for that—which he was sure they couldn’t—Shadow didn’t think he ever would. 

Blue was the only one who could offer him absolution, and Blue was gone. All that was left of him were the memories his family held, and the echoes of emotions that Shadow could still hold onto in his soul, imprinted there by the gemstones that dwelled in his pocket. 

He wondered if the Wachowskis would be able to pick up on those feelings, once he gave them the gems back, or if they were just another thing that he was destined to take from them.

Chapter Text

Shadow stayed awake. He’d staved off his exhaustion anyway, having slept from the early afternoon until the morning when Tails had found him. Any time he closed his eyes for too long, he saw Blue’s bright gaze staring back at him, and Maria’s body underfoot, and a sky so dark it blotted out the stars. 

He preferred to avoid sitting over the only people who’d ever cared about him, watching as blood dripped onto stones and fire licked at skin, all while he was helpless to do a single thing.

And so, he stayed awake. He picked back up the book that Rouge had given him, making his way steadily through the chapters.

He finally finished just as night was beginning to fall. At the end of the book, the protagonist had been given a chance to return to Earth, his original planet, but chose to stay on the new planet, even as the only human there. He had found friends and family, and had made a new home for himself. 

(See? Maria said. You don’t need to be from a place for that place to be your home.)

(Yeah, did I look like I was from Earth? Blue asked.)

Shadow closed the book and stared at the cover, an astronaut falling away from the light and into the darkness.

It was rapidly becoming too dim to make out the words, the walls of the cave blocking out any of the moon’s beams. Shadow scrunched his nose and pulled the gemstones out of his pocket. A small glow emanated from each of them, and he drew the white one into his palm, putting the other six away. The light was low, but it was enough for him to see the text. He flipped to the first page again, and started the book from the beginning.

(Oh, good, Blue said. I wasn’t really paying attention the first time.)

Shadow emerged from the cave mid-morning of the next day. While he had been left alone after Tails had departed, he had no idea how long that would last for, and either way he knew that he had to get this over with. If he held onto the gemstones any longer, he might be tempted to use their power again, just to see if he could figure out a way to get back the feeling of Blue’s soul singing in tune with his own.

He did not run to 55 Plymouth Road. Instead, he walked, and rather slowly at that. Each step felt like a challenge. He couldn’t tell if it was because he was still exhausted, or because every part of him was telling him to just turn around and leave. Either way, going back wasn’t an option.

(You’ve got this , Maria encouraged him. One foot in front of the other.)

(Could stand to go a little faster, Blue joked. But anything’s better than nothing. At least we know who’d win in a race.)

Shadow scoffed and continued walking.

The air was cool, a calm breeze drifting past his ears. Shadow gazed up at the leaves that formed the canopy, sunlight filtering through them and creating dozens more shades of green than he had names for. Birds chirped in the branches, and he thought it might be the first time he’d ever heard them himself.

For a moment, Shadow wondered—truly wondered—how the Professor could want to destroy all of this. Shadow had understood, at the time. He had wanted it, too, afterall. Shadow had never known Earth like this, though. He’d seen the flowers on the mountaintop at night, but more than that he’d seen the stars, which would remain just as they were, regardless if the Earth was there to see them. Shadow had never experienced the beauty of this planet in anything other than Maria, not until that moment on the Moon, staring off at the Sun with Blue at his side.

The Professor, though, had lived on Earth for his whole life. He’d seen the trees, and heard the birds, and felt the breeze, and he’d wanted to burn it all down anyway. 

(Professor, he’d said slowly, Is this really what Maria would have wanted?)

(Gerald had turned to him, face marred with fury and grief. The question isn’t ‘what Maria would have wanted?’ It’s ‘what do they deserve?’)

Despite what the Professor had said, is this what Maria would have wanted was the question that Shadow had asked, and he had not been afforded an answer. At least, not from the man who was meant to give him one.

(The birds are singing and the sun is shining and the world is alive , Maria said. He could hear her smile. It’s beautiful, Shadow.)

He was sure it was. He wished he could see it as she did. Maria and Blue weighed heavy in his heart, though, and he thought they might stay there forever. He swallowed past a lump in his throat and kept moving.

(Is this what Maria would have wanted?)

(No.)

Houses began to come into view. Shadow didn’t know where to go to be spat out in the Wachowskis’ backyard, and he didn’t really think they’d appreciate that anyway.

He located the correct street far easier than he had the first time, though, and barely even needed to glance at the numbers on the mailboxes to find the right one.

Shadow stood in front of 55 Plymouth Road and tried to force back the nerves that were threatening to emerge again.

(It’s okay to be nervous, Maria crooned)

“I know,” Shadow said through gritted teeth. He set his jaw, trudged up the steps, and knocked on the door.

The yellow alien—Tails—answered.

“Oh!” He exclaimed, hovering a bit as if it was a natural response to a surprise. “Hey, Shadow.”

“Hello,” he said. “I am here.”

“Yeah, uh, I can see that,” Tails said. 

They stared at one another for a long moment before Maddie’s voice called out, “Who’s at the door, sweetheart?”

“Uh— It’s Shadow,” Tails replied. There was a beat of silence, and then the rush of footsteps, and Maddie appeared in the doorway as well.

“You came back,” she said, sounding just a tad shocked.

Shadow resisted the urge to shove his hands into his jacket’s pockets. “You asked me to.” He left out the part where he’d fully planned on not coming anyway, only to be convinced by voices of dead people that didn’t seem to want to leave him alone.

Maddie smiled softly, and it was far too kind a smile to be directed at someone like him. “Well, come on in. Can I get you anything?”

Shadow had never really had any favorite foods or drinks. He liked whatever Maria liked, and she liked whatever was available in the cafeteria for the day. “I’m all right,” because he didn’t really have a good answer for her. 

Maddie clicked her tongue. “Well, at least have some water,” she said, and gestured him inside. Shadow followed, trying not to let his hesitance show in his movements, and Tails closed the front door behind him. 

Their house was nice. It looked just as picturesque as the town had from the mountain above. 

(I’d love to take full credit, but I think we both know that my taste is more beanbags and street signs, Blue snickered.)

There were photos in frames along shelves, and after the first one had Blue’s bright eyes staring back at him, Shadow did his best to avoid looking at any others.

Maddie guided him to a seat in her kitchen, pouring him a glass of water and nursing a mug of her own. Shadow had no idea what she was drinking, and couldn’t find the words to ask. He took a sip of his water, and relished in the loss of his dry mouth. He hadn’t realized how thirsty he was until this moment, and it took every ounce of his strength not to drain the glass in one go.

“Everyone forgives you, you know,” Maddie finally said, breaking the silence. Tails was nowhere to be found, and so it was just the two of them. “We understand. All of my kids have had hard lives, and have made bad decisions because of them. You’re hurting, and you’ve been hurting. What matters is the choices that you made in the end.”

Shadow didn’t think he could reply. The gemstones were radiating a familiar warmth, one that he wanted to chase, but would likely never feel again. That warmth had fallen to Earth, brilliant and nameless, and Shadow didn’t even have the strength to ask if there was a body left to bury.

Maddie opened her mouth to speak again, but was stopped by a rumbling upstairs.

“Hedgehog!” 

The red alien appeared in the kitchen, Tails hovering behind him. “His name is Shadow,” the yellow alien said, but his older brother ignored him.

“You have been named a sworn enemy of the tribe,” the red alien continued.

“Which we, as a family, have since rescinded,” Maddie sighed.

“And now you dare to enter our home during such times of sorrow and recovery? Why? To mock us?”

Maddie ran a hand down her face. “He made mistakes, hun. He apologized. He’s been forgiven.”

The red alien crossed his arms. “Not by me,” he persisted. 

Maddie leveled him with a stern look. “Need I remind you how you entered this house, young man?”

All of a sudden, the red alien dropped his head, as if embarrassed. “Apologies, Mother,” he said, admonished. “It is only…”

Maddie exhaled slowly and placed a hand on her son’s shoulder. “You’re trying to protect your family, Knuckles. That’s all right. But remember, it is Tom’s and my job to protect this family, too, long before it is yours . You’ve got your own duties. You don't have to worry about ours.”

Shadow didn’t think he could remember a single time that Gerald had spoken to him with such kindness.

(There was a reason it was only Maria and Blue’s voices that he heard.)

“Of course, Mother,” the red alien—Knuckles—said. He straightened once more. “On such a topic, may I request that the fox and I continue our search for the Master Emerald?”

Shadow wondered if it was Rouge’s influence that made those words pique his interest.

“‘Our search,’” Tails scoffed. “You mean you sit there while I scan the entire world for any out-of-place Chaos Energy, when the Emerald could be floating through space for all we know.”

“‘Emerald?’” Shadow echoed. The group startled, as if they’d forgotten that he was there.

Then, Knuckles spoke. “Protecting the Master Emerald is the sworn duty of my tribe—my original tribe—the Echidnas. It has the power to transform thoughts to reality.”

“You used it,” Tails added. “To stop the Eclipse Cannon. The Master Emerald splits into the seven Chaos Emeralds—which we still haven’t figured out, by the way. Sometimes they reform on their own, sometimes they don’t.” His voice lowered. “It’ll be way easier if they did. One emerald is a lot less to scan for than seven.”

The gemstones—the Emeralds—thrummed in his pocket, and he reached up to undo the button and the zipper.

“It wouldn’t happen to be these that you’re looking for, would it?” Shadow drew the gems into his hand and held them out. They sat innocently in the center of his glove, glowing faintly.

Tails squealed. “Oh, thank Gaia. Yes! That’s them!”

Knuckles took a step toward him and extended his own hand. “May I?” He asked. Shadow shrugged and deposited the emeralds into the open palm. Knuckles drew them closer and pressed his other hand overtop. A bright green glow burst through the cracks, and when the hands moved apart, a single large emerald glittered where seven had once sat.

“Huh,” Shadow said, because he wasn’t quite sure what else to say. He could imagine how Rouge would salivate at the sight of such a jewel. It was probably a good thing she never knew what his little treasures could become.

“Maybe we should find a different place to store it,” Tails suggested lightly. “I love Wade as much as the next person, but—”

“Wait,” Shadow cut in. “You gave an artifact that can grant that sort of power to that man?” He couldn’t imagine entrusting this Master Emerald with anyone other than perhaps Maria. That police officer he’d met was so low on the list he might as well not even be on it at all.

“He is a trustworthy warrior,” Knuckles said, sounding a bit offended.

“We never said he wasn’t,” Maddie replied calmly. “But I think Tails and Shadow might be right. Perhaps your brother can invent something to help keep it safe.”

Tails grinned. “Oh, I’d love to! C’mon, Knuckles, let’s go to the basement and see what we can do!”

The two of them scurried past, but not before the older pat Shadow on the shoulder and gave a firm nod. Shadow did his best to return it, and Knuckles looked satisfied, moving to follow his younger brother.

Maddie sighed as what must be the basement door closed behind them. “Well, that’s about all we’ll see of them today.”

“Sorry,” Shadow said. He wasn’t sure why he was apologizing, but it felt like the right thing to do.

“No, no, there’s no need for that,” Maddie insisted. “You brought back the Master Emerald, something that, while important to our family, also offers infinite power. If anything, I should almost be apologizing to you.”

Shadow ducked his head. “I don’t want infinite power. I—I never have.”

Her eyes softened. Bile crawled up in his throat at the look. She reached forward, and Shadow fell back, shooting to his feet. 

“Shadow—”

“Thank you for having me,” he said quickly, “But I’ll be going now. I just came to give the—the Emeralds back. That was all. You won’t see me again.”

Her brow furrowed. “You’re leaving? To go where?”

He swallowed hard. “You don’t need to concern yourself with that.”

She looked like she wanted to respond to that, but instead pursed her lips. She turned her head to the side, and then back to him. “Come to dinner tomorrow.”

Shadow blinked. “What?”

“We’re having family dinner tomorrow,” Maddie said. “Well, as much as we can with—with things as they are. Join us.”

“I can’t,” Shadow replied.

“Why not?”

He didn’t have a good answer.

“Just… Come to dinner, please.” She folded her hands on the counter and stared meaningfully at him. “We won’t force you to stay, we won’t call anyone to come after you, we just…” She closed her eyes for a moment, and Shadow wondered if she was seeing Blue’s face in her mind the same way he was. “Please.”

Shadow’s throat hurt, and his stomach churned, and Blue was laughing in his ear, bright and lively as he never would be again. 

(You’re starving, Shadow, Maria whispered. Go to dinner.)

(C’mon, you’re not gonna say no to my mom, are you? Blue asked. After everything?)

“Okay,” Shadow finally managed to say. “I’ll come to dinner tomorrow.”

Maddie smiled gently. “Good. Five-thirty, sharp. Don’t be late.”

(It’s okay if you are, Blue said. She won’t be mad. Promise.)

“I don’t plan on it,” Shadow replied. He made for the door again, pockets lighter and heart heavier, and this time no one stopped him.

Chapter Text

Shadow’s jacket was dirty. He shouldn’t wear it.

He didn’t want to leave it behind.

(Just tie it around your waist, Maria suggested. It’ll look cool.)

Shadow had never had clothes to do that with, but Maria had done it with hers. When they’d be running around the base for hours, she’d complain that she was sweating to death and strip off her top layer, doing a quick knot with the sleeves before continuing whatever game they’d been playing.

His hands trembled a bit, but Shadow did the same thing, being careful not to pull too tight. Even if he would never admit it, he was a fan of having the jacket. When he wrapped it over his arms as he slept, he could almost pretend there was someone holding him other than the loneliness.

(Someone would, Blue said. If you just asked.)

Shadow was not going to impose himself on Blue’s family, no matter what his dead voice, tainted by the love for them felt through those Chaos Emeralds, wanted him to do.

He didn’t run to the Wachowskis’. He left right when the old clock in the cave read a-quarter-to-five, and arrived six minutes before he’d been told to. He probably would have been right on time, but would rather risk being early than being late, and so had picked up the pace as he wandered along the racing trails Blue must have set up with his family.

Shadow felt nerves well up within himself again, and was quite frustrated when he realized that he couldn’t shove his hands into the jacket’s pockets with it tied around him. He did his best to grind the claw on his pointer finger into his thumb instead, annoyed at how the fabric of the glove lessened the pain. The silver Chaos Blocker on one wrist and gold inhibitor ring on the other mocked him, and he wondered if they would think he was strange for not matching them. His book and phone box were tucked under one arm. He needed to hold onto those too.

Before Shadow could knock on the door, it swung open, revealing the red alien—Knuckles—on the other side.

“Hedgehog,” Knuckles greeted. Shadow still didn’t understand that one. “You are early.”

“Better than being late,” Shadow replied.

Knuckles nodded in acknowledgement. “Mother and the fox have mostly finished the food, regardless. Come.”

Shadow did his best to swipe off any dirt from his shoes on the front mat before following Knuckles through the house and into what must be their dining room.

“Oh, hi, Shadow!” Tails exclaimed, smiling widely as he drifted in from the kitchen, holding tight to a basket of bread. He passed it off to Knuckles, who placed it in the center of the table. “Good to see you!”

“Thanks,” Shadow said, not quite sure how to take such a measure of positivity. “It is… good to be here.”

“And we are glad to have you,” Maddie said, emerging from the kitchen as well. She placed a variety of things down, few of which Shadow could immediately recognize, before turning to her sons. “Tails, could you help me finish setting the table? Knuckles, go to your father, see if he plans on coming, and grab him if he does. And don’t actually grab him. Just, tell him dinner’s ready.”

“Of course. The mission will be completed to your exact specifications,” Knuckles nodded firmly, giving some sort of salute before marching off toward the front of the house.

Maddie shook her head fondly before turning to Shadow. “You can take a seat anywhere you’d like. It’ll just be a few minutes.”

She and Tails disappeared back into the kitchen, and Shadow took a moment to stare at the dining table, devoid of any sign of who sat where. The scientists and the soldiers back at the facility had always been very particular about where everyone, especially Shadow, had to be at all times. He had specific spots where he was meant to sit, where he was meant to sleep. Any deviation could land him right back in the tube, until Maria appealed to the Professor enough that he pulled strings to let him out again.

Shadow had no idea what the arrangement was for this family, and no way of figuring it out, either.

(Just sit wherever, dude, Blue said. It’s not a big deal.)

It very much was a big deal, because this wasn’t Shadow’s family. It was Blue’s family.

(Exactly, Blue pressed.)

Shadow ignored him. There was a huff behind him, and he whirled around, hackles raised, only to see an animal standing there, staring at him. It was the dog from the window, with golden hair and dark eyes.

The dog stepped closer to him, nose twitching, and Shadow moved back just a bit.

“You can pet him,” Tails said over his shoulder. He had a variety of silverware clutched in his hand, approaching the table to lay them out. “Right behind the ears. He likes it there.”

(Just like you, Shadow, Maria teased.)

Shadow reached forward slowly, being careful not to startle the animal. His fingers landed on the dog’s head, and though he couldn’t feel it through the gloves, he could tell that it was soft. The dog’s tail wagged lazily, and he leaned up to sniff Shadow’s face. After a moment, he huffed again and backed away, wandering behind Tails back into the kitchen.

(Well, that’s another family member that approves, Blue laughed.)

The table was set soon after, Maddie and Tails joining him in the dining room, and the stairs near the front of the house creaked with footsteps.

“Mother and the fox will be glad you are here," he heard Knuckles say. “And I suppose that I am, as well.”

“Love you too, buddy,” a male voice responded. 

(Dad! Blue exclaimed, love clambering against Shadow's heart.)

Maddie smiled as Knuckles and a human man entered the room. “Tom. Glad you’re here. He was okay with you leaving?”

“Insisted on it, actually,” the man—Blue’s Tom—said. “Told me to ‘have a mai tai’ and ‘enjoy time with my wife.’ Between you and me, I think he was just tired. I told him someone would be back to stay with him after dinner.”

Maddie chuckled. “Well, doctors said he should be good as soon as tomorrow. It’ll be the few weeks ‘til he can get out and about again that’ll really kill him.”

Tom exhaled through his teeth. “Yeah, I am not excited for that.”

The man turned his attention to Shadow, and for a moment all he could see was a pale face, Blue leaning over a still body, and eyes filled with lightning as what did you do?

(What I had to.)

(You didn’t have to, Maria soothed. But you know that, now.)

“Shadow,” Tom said, and he did his best to convince his quills to continue laying flat.

“Mr. Wachowski,” Shadow replied.

“Tom is fine.” The man had his arm in a sling, and bruises snaked up along his neck from his chest, but his eyes were shockingly warm. “It’s good to see that you’re okay.”

Shadow flexed his fingers to try and bat away another shock of pain and did his best not to avoid eye contact. “Yes. I’m fine. It is… I am glad to know that you are all right, as well.”

Tom shrugged. “Wasn’t as bad as it looked. It’ll be a few months, but I’ll be okay.” He winked. “Easier with G.U.N. footing the bill.”

Shadow had not known that G.U.N. was paying for their medical expenses, but he supposed it made sense. It was likely easier than dealing with the hell that he expected Maddie Wachowski would raise otherwise.

“All right.” Maddie clapped her hands together. “Let’s eat!”

There were six seats at the table. Tom and Maddie sat on either end, with Tails next to the former and Knuckles next to the latter, on opposite sides from one another. Shadow tried not to grind his teeth together as he scanned over his options. Sitting between Maddie and Tails seemed the far more palatable option. He hesitantly pulled himself onto the chair, placing the book and box onto the seat next to him.

Shadow couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a home-cooked meal. In actuality, he didn’t think he ever had. The food in the laboratory’s cafeteria had been fine, but it was being prepared for a large number of people, scientists and soldiers alike, and he hadn’t been afforded much access to it anyway. There was nothing loving about it. 

The closest thing, he thought, might have been his second Christmas with Maria. She’d convinced her grandfather to call for fresh ingredients to be brought in, and had shown him how to make sugar cookies. 

(They were my mother’s recipe, Maria said wistfully. We nearly burned ourselves trying to brown the butter.)

Eating those cookies, with messy frosting and too-many-sprinkles, was one of the few times that Shadow truly saw the Professor smile at him, wide and genuine as he got crumbs in his moustache and wrapped an arm around each of them.

(I miss him, Maria whispered.)

Shadow wasn't sure if she missed the Professor, or the man that he used to be. Shadow wasn’t sure if it was her thinking that, or himself.

“Oh, take more food than that, Shadow,” Maddie said, snapping him from his thoughts. “You’re a guest.”

He looked down at his plate. There was one bread roll, a few green beans, what he supposed might be a handful of roasted potatoes, and maybe a third of a small chicken breast. It didn’t even cover half of the plate. Every other person’s was full.

“I don’t need to eat that much,” Shadow said. “Different biology.”

Tails snorted. “What? Who told you that? I’ve made entire diagrams about this stuff, of course you need to eat. Malnutrition will stunt your growth.”

Tom nodded. “That’s what happened with Sonic.”

“I never had to in the lab,” Shadow shrugged. 

“Well, you were in a lab,” Maddie said. “If you weren’t eating that much, I’m sure you were still getting nutrition from other sources.”

Shadow hadn’t really thought of it, but he supposed she was right. His growth was carefully monitored by the scientists in the facility, and most of the nutrients that he got were from different needles that pumped them directly into his veins. He didn’t have access to that anymore.

(That’s why you’re so hungry, Maria said.)

(Dude, we’ve been trying to tell you, Blue chuckled.)

“Oh,” Shadow said. “I suppose you’re right.”

Maddie smiled, reached over, and piled some more food onto his plate.

Shadow was quiet as he ate, despite the conversation that rose up around him. He was sure that the food was good, and he wished that he could properly enjoy it, but his mouth tasted of ash. Across the room, propped on the wall, a picture of a younger Blue, grinning up at the camera as he stood along a lake, taunted him.

How could he be doing this? He had gotten Blue killed, had let him die, even as it made his soul wail in agony, and now he sat here with his family, eating dinner and listening to people that Blue would never be able to be with again.

He remembered one of the movies he’d watched with Maria, with the alien monster that destroyed homes and lives and was none the wiser to the pain it caused.

Shadow was worse than that monster. He had tried to destroy the planet, he’d managed to destroy a family, and here he sat, fully aware of the pain that he brought to the world. Was Blue’s family treating him this way to honor his legacy? Shadow couldn’t imagine a single other reason. 

(Shadow , Maria said sternly. You need to breathe.)

Did he? He’d been in space, and he’d been in the tube, and all that time his lungs had managed to keep working. Did he even need air? Was he even alive in the first place?

(Of course you’re alive, Blue said. You need a heart to beat in tandem with mine.)

Blue’s heart didn’t beat anymore, though. If they were meant to beat together, then Shadow should simply rip his own out of his chest and let it stutter its way to a stop, just as its other half did.

For a moment, he wished he’d never accepted Blue’s hand. Those Emeralds had bonded them, and then that bond had been ripped away, and what remained was left raw and frayed and broken . Whenever he thought of it, he wanted nothing more than to tear his inhibitor rings off and let his Chaos Energy overpower him. 

It would be easier than continuing as he was.

(Don’t be stupid, Maria said.)

(Yeah, that’s my job, Blue laughed.)

Not anymore.

He pushed away from the table, and the conversations fell silent. His book clattered to the floor.

A beat.

“Shadow?” Maddie looked at him, brow furrowed, gaze scrutinizing. “Is something wrong?”

His throat was clogged. His mouth was dry. Words wouldn’t come.

Tom offered a half-smile. “C’mon, little dude. Take a breath. Sonic would kill us if something happened to you before you guys even had a chance to talk.”

“Stop it!” Shadow’s words were strained. His blood ran hot, and his heart pounded, and his eyes burned. “Just stop it! I don’t understand!”

“What don’t you understand?” Maddie asked gently. He wanted to strangle something.

“The way you’re—you’re being so—so—” Shadow let out a choked sound and tugged at the fur on his chest, as if the pain would ground him. It didn’t, because it never did. “After everything I did—”

“We forgave you,” Tails said. His voice was small, but firm. “You did the right thing in the end. You said sorry. It’s okay.”

Knuckles nodded. “You need not think about it further. You have earned the tribe’s forgiveness, hedgehog. Simple.”

“No, not simple!” Shadow didn’t understand. Why didn’t they get it?

(What is there to get? Blue asked.)

“Shut up,” Shadow ground out. “I don’t want to hear from you right now.”

There was a moment of tense quiet, before Tom said slowly, “I think we’re all a little confused, buddy. What’s wrong with us forgiving you?”

“I don’t deserve it!” Shadow exclaimed. “You don’t— I wasn’t meant to make it out of there. That was my absolution. I ruined everything, and that was gonna fix it, but I couldn’t even die properly.” He closed his eyes to try and keep the tears from coming. He wasn’t sure if he was angry or embarrassed or sad anymore. He was too drained to figure it out. “And now you want me here, and you shouldn’t. I just—I just let him die, and you’re acting like it’s all okay, and I don’t know what I’m supposed to—” 

His voice cracked. Shadow swallowed, and tried to force air that he might not even need back into his lungs. Pain coursed through his body as his Chaos Energy, reacting to his outburst, pushed against the cuff.
His breaths were hitched, and the room was silent, and his face burned. 

“Shadow,” Maddie finally said. “Who…Who did you let die?”

(Me, Maria murmured. It didn’t really sound like her.)

(Me, Blue whispered. It didn’t really sound like him.)

(Me, Shadow’s soul screamed, and there was no mistaking his own voice. If only this were a more perfect world.)

He grit his teeth and forced back what might have been a sob, if it managed to break free. Blue’s love for his family had his heart in a vice grip, and it made him sick. The lights flickered, until the candles dotting the room were for more than just decoration. “Your—Your— Blue. He—He shared the power of those—those Chaos Emeralds with me, and then I— When I felt them— I didn’t let them leave, and so they left him, and I didn’t even— I didn’t catch him. I just let him fall.”

Maddie let out a shaky sigh. “Okay. Right.” She might have been searching for something to say, but nothing seemed to be coming. 

Tom’s face was pale, and Knuckles and Tails were staring at him with wide eyes, and Shadow didn’t have enough energy left in him to care.

Tears forced their way past his lids, and Shadow tried his best to hold back the pathetic sounds trying to escape from his throat. He rubbed his eyes. It didn’t help. Sparks danced over his quills. The cuff was tight around his wrist, pulsing with power, setting his blood on fire. He wasn’t sure if he felt hysterical or desperate or something else entirely. His shoulders heaved, but he felt remarkably empty.

Blue and Maria hovered in his mind, behind his eyes, within his soul. No matter what he did, they sat there, waiting for him, an endless reminder of everything that he’d lost. “I keep hearing them,” he breathed, a quiet secret, like the flame of a candle just before it went out. His vision was blurred, and his head pounded, and his soul ached for something it would never have again. “I keep hearing her, and I keep hearing him, and you won’t let me go long enough to outrun them.” 

Chapter Text

Time was meaningless.

How could it be anything else, when every day felt the same?

He could recall when he’d woken, dragged from the rock with no memories or past to speak of. Sometimes, he wished that they’d left him there. Maybe he would have some day starved, his Chaos Energy no longer able to sustain him, but at least he would know peace.

Instead, his existence was confined to three places: the tube, the track, and the lab. 

The tube was perhaps his favorite, for its simplicity. The fluid within made him feel numb, allowing him to forget the aches and pain. It conducted his Chaos Energy as well, keeping his lungs working despite the lack of air. 

He was confined, but sometimes he liked to imagine that the glass was keeping him safe from the scientists, rather than the other way around.

When he wasn’t in the tube, the track was the next best option. There, he could run as fast as he wanted, channeling his Energy into the shoes the scientists locked his feet in, and he could almost pretend that he was alone. The buzzing beneath his skin would stop for just a moment, and it would just be him and the endless turn of his legs, until a shock was sent through the floor to bring him to a halt. It was exhausting, leaving his shoulders heaving and his limbs twitching, but it was manageable, and he could appreciate that.

He would take a week straight of running on the track over even an hour in the lab.

After waking in the tube in the beginning, he had quickly fallen unconscious again, only to be roused lying spread out on a table. Scientists were around him, with goggles and masks that covered their faces and sharp tools in their hands. 

It was his first experience with life, and was not a very pleasant one.

One of the scalpels pressed into his arm, and he felt something surge within him in response. A moment later, he was on the other side of the room. It took a moment for him to gather his bearings, and in that time a needle was pressed into his neck. His vision blurred, and hands grabbed at him, pulling him back to the table and strapping him to it.

He reached for the feeling again, the surge within his chest, but it was gone, whatever he’d been injected with making his thoughts muddled.

It did nothing to stop the pain, though.

The scientists continued working as if nothing had happened, lengthening the incision and holding it open. When they began to dig around inside of his arm, a whimper was pulled from his throat. 

“Quiet,” one of them hissed, and he pressed his lips together, doing his best not to let any more sounds escape. Maybe if he listened to them, they would be less cruel.

He was never quite sure if it worked, but he didn’t want to risk it.

They didn’t speak to him often, though they conversed with one another in front of him. Anything directed at him would either be curt commands to follow or low musings that he was sure he wasn’t expected to respond to.

“You’re a fascinating thing, you know that?” The head scientist said to him once. It was during a feeding time, when he’d have a dozen needles sticking out of him to pump nutrients into his body. “Your Chaos Energy— I’ve never seen anything like it.”

He kept his eyes trained on the ground. Most of the scientists weren’t happy when they met his gaze. Unsettling, they called it. He wouldn’t know. 

“I had always thought that we’d never be able to use Chaos Energy for anything substantial,” the head scientist continued. The others called him 'Professor.’ Perhaps that was his name, but it was used like a title. “Not without a way to generate it, at least. We tried, of course, or rather I tried, but nothing ever…” He sighed. “You’re a marvel, 013. You will bring the world into a new era, I just know it.”

The Professor called him 013, or the Ultimate Lifeform, when he was especially deep into his studies. The rest of the scientists did, too, but more often they referred to him as ‘the specimen.’ He wasn’t sure what that word meant. He wasn’t sure which one was meant to be his name.

He wasn’t sure if he had a name.

Time went on. 

He reveled in the calm of the tube, tried to enjoy being on the track, and did his best to forget the lab.

As it was, he never could. Some days, he would fight sleep in the tube just to avoid the images of the lab when he closed his eyes. Once one of the scientists figured it out, they started checking up on him more, making sure that he was actually resting, and adding something to the fluid to make him pass out if he wasn’t.

His Chaos Energy made him heal quickly, and it seemed to encourage the scientists to attempt more and more painful things. He wasn’t sure if they were trying to hurt him, but he also wasn’t sure that they cared.

They would peel back his skin to watch the way lightning zipped through his blood. They would trap him in a tank of water until he drowned because they were curious if he could. They would cut open his chest to see how his lungs managed to keep up with a heart that beat so fast. Every time, a combination of Chaos Energy and electricity would shock life back into him, and it would start all over again.

Sometimes, when he was left alone in the tube, he would allow his thoughts to wander. 

Was this what life was? How was it fair that he was unlucky enough to be below the knife, rather than on the other side of it? He wondered if there were any other beings like him, if this was the kind of life that they led too. The Professor didn’t make it sound like it.

The scientists didn’t bother him in the tube, at least. They would knock him out when they wanted to remove him, and he would wake up somewhere else. They’d monitor him with machines rather than by sight, and he could pretend that he was alone, somewhere they could never get to him again. Such fantasies would always be broken the moment he opened his eyes to find himself strapped to the lab table again, but it was a nice dream.

That nice dream was all he had to comfort him.

One day, though, something changed. 

He was in the tube, trying to find solace in the dream, when he felt a presence behind him. The scientists never came in unless they wanted something, and did not like it when he ignored them. 

As he turned, he couldn’t help the glare that settled onto his face. He did not like them, and if he could not speak to them, he would let them know another way.

The face on the other side of the glass was a new one. She looked smaller, and wasn’t dressed in the same whites and blacks the scientists wore. Her expression screwed up into a faux glare, mirroring the lines he felt carved into his own, and he thought she might be mocking him.

The glare faded quickly, replaced by an eager smile. The scientists only ever smiled at him when they made a discovery they were excited about. Sometimes the Professor did, when he articulated the many plans he had for the future. They were never at him , though. Not like this one was.

She drew on the glass with marker, tracing the area around his head. After a moment, she stepped away, smile widening and shoulders shaking just a bit. He shifted back, but the drawing made no sense to him. He glanced at her, though, and the circle fit around her face, making her look a bit silly. He wondered if the shapes she drew meant anything beyond being strange.

Her lips closed again, but the smile remained, and he felt the corners of his mouth twitch up as well. The glare vanished. He didn’t know who she was, but she was different from the scientists, different from the guards and the Professor. Despite the coolness of the fluid around him, his chest felt warm.

She hesitantly placed a hand against the glass. His smile disappeared as he studied it. There was nothing on her skin, no tools in her grasp. He wasn’t sure what he was meant to do, what sort of test he was trying to pass.

Her eyes were wide, and after a moment she nodded to him, inclining her head toward the hand. He swallowed and then raised his own hand. She didn’t move away—didn’t even flinch—and he spread his fingers against hers, only a single sheet of glass separating them. Her smile returned, and his own followed.

A figure appeared suddenly in the door, and she whirled away from him. The Professor approached rapidly, talking quickly and taking her by the shoulders. She responded, gesturing wildly. He couldn’t hear what they were saying.

Her hand was still on the glass.

She waved to him, to their hands meeting, and looked at the Professor with big eyes. The Professor rubbed his temples, took her by the hand, and led her from the room. Her gaze stayed on the tube until she disappeared around the corner.

He was alone again. He let his hand slowly fall, and tried to ignore the growing pit in his stomach.

Time continued to pass, detailed with two more trips to the track and another three sessions in the lab. The Professor said nothing about her the few moments they spent together, and she seemed to be more myth than reality. Perhaps she was just something from his imagination, an angel to grace his dream.

She wasn’t. She appeared again after a few days, standing outside of the tube when he woke. She drew more things on the glass, and made faces that he tried to mimic. She smiled widely at him, and seemed thrilled when he returned them.

He continued to go to the lab and to the track, but her presence when he was in the tube became more and more common. He could see her speak to him, but couldn’t hear a single word. She was animated, though, lively and bright, and it was nice enough to just sit and watch her, even if he had no idea what she could be rambling about.

One day, she came in when he was awake. A jolt of excitement ran through him, only to be quickly stamped out when the Professor trailed in behind her. She quickly picked up on his dwindling mood, as she hopped into his line of view. 

He could not hear her, but he thought she might be comforting him. The Professor stood in the darkness at the edge of the room, and he forced himself to try and focus on her, and the light that she brought with her.

His gaze kept flicking to where the Professor was, though, attention off of the games that they always played, and eventually she knocked on the glass to draw him back to her. She smiled gently, placing a hand on the side of the tube. His own tingled beneath the glove from freshly-healed wounds where the scientists had cut open his palm to observe the bones within. He pressed his hand against the imprint of hers, and smiled back.

The next day, he woke to something different.

The Professor stood outside of the tube. Guards were stationed at the exit. Scientists dotted the room. Next to the Professor, though, was her. She bounced on the balls of her feet, smile growing larger the moment she noticed that he was awake. She leaned forward, placing her hand on the glass, and despite the audience, he did the same.

The Professor nodded, turned and said something to another scientist, and the fluid in the tube began to shift. 

Bubbles appeared at the bottom, and he felt himself sink as the tube was drained until eventually he stood on solid ground. A blast of air assaulted him, blowing him dry. He shook himself to force everything back into place, and then the glass of the tube was raised up into the ceiling, leaving him without a bit of protection in a room full of people that had given him little but pain.

Except for her.

She stepped forward, even as the Professor placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Hello!” She exclaimed. “I’m Maria! What’s your name?” Maria.

“This is the pride of the Chaos Initiative.” the Professor said. “The Ultimate Lifeform: Specimen-013.”

Maria snorted. “That’s boring. You didn’t even give him a name?”

“It’s an experiment,” one of the other scientists piped up. “It doesn’t need a name.”

He might have been an experiment, but he seemed to be important. Did he matter to them or not? It barely ever felt like it.

“Come on!” Maria said. “Look at that face! He wants a name, don’t you?”

He stared at her. 

“Work with me here,” she said, lowering her voice as if it was a secret, before raising it again. “See, he’s not even attacking anyone! He deserves to have a name. And he wants one, right?”

She looked at him meaningfully, before spreading her arms out, as if appealing to the scientists. They had always wanted him to be quiet. It had been the first command that they had ever given him, and he had followed it ever since, but he didn’t care about what they thought as much as he cared about what she did. He swallowed, biting the inside of his cheek before he made his decision and said, “Yes.”

The result was instantaneous. Maria squealed, a few of the scientists shouted, and the Professor’s jaw dropped in shock.

“You can talk?” The Professor asked.

“You can talk!” Maria cheered.

“How—How long have you been able to do that?” The Professor adjusted his glasses, patting around for a pen that he had dropped. “Where did you learn?”

He didn’t have a proper answer for those questions. He had known what they were saying from the moment that he first woke. Perhaps he had learned from whatever place he had come from before, the past that he couldn’t remember and couldn’t get back.

“Always,” he said instead.

One of the scientists disappeared behind a desk, a faint thump sounding as they hit the ground.

“So you do want a name?” Maria asked, leaning forward as her eyes gleamed.

He turned to her and nodded.

“Oh, Grandfather, please, can I give him a name? Can I?”

The Professor seemed to still be in a bit of shock, but his gaze softened when he looked at her, and he inclined his head. “I don’t see why not.”

She laughed. Her feet easily carried her up the steps to his side, and she rounded him quickly before smoothing back the fur between his ears. It sent a shiver down his spine, a touch with no malice behind it. He leaned into her fingers without meaning to, and she gave him a steady scratch in response.

Maria hummed, glanced around the room, and then declared, “Shadow! Your name is Shadow!” Her eyes flicked to meet his. “If you like it, I mean. Your choice. Your name can be whatever you'd like it to be.”

The word rolled over in his mind. Shadow. A name. One that was all for him.

“I like it,” he said. He thought he would have liked any name she gave him.

Maria grinned. “Great! Now we can introduce ourselves properly.” She held out a hand. He wasn’t quite sure what she wanted him to do with it. “Oh, sorry. You say your name, and then ‘nice to meet you,’ and then we shake hands and I do the same.”

He could handle that. “Hello. I am— My name is Shadow. It is nice to meet you.” He took her hand.

Her eyes sparkled. “I’m Maria Robotnik. It’s nice to meet you too, Shadow.”

Changes would come. He was alive, in a way that none of them had expected. He could speak and he could listen and he could think for himself. Every moment from that point on would be an unexpected variable to try and account for. One day, they would account for it in a way the world would never quite be able to recover from.

For the moment, though, those changes were distant. Maria held his hand, and her smile was wide, and his heart was flooding with a warmth that was new and different. It was one that he wouldn’t feel with anyone else until he sat on the surface of the Moon, staring off at the Earth as he spoke with the first person he’d ever met who actually understood.  

Memories were fickle. One moment they were there, the next they were gone, floating away on a wind that blew in from the storm of his thoughts. Maria’s hand was no longer in his, her smile vanishing like smoke, and the warmth that she and Blue settled in his chest was replaced by a void, cold and empty.

He woke with a jolt.

A hand came up to cover his mouth, and he immediately went to bite it. The hand moved out of reach, and Tails’s face appeared in his view, glaring at him.

“Be quiet,” the little alien hissed. The room that they were in was relatively dark, though sunlight tried to peek through closed curtains.

He could hear voices below them, downstairs most likely, and muffled enough that they were relatively unintelligible. 

“Is someone here?” He asked in a low voice.

Tails hesitated for a moment before saying, “G.U.N.” 

(G.U.N.? Maria gasped, phantom hands clawing at his shoulders.)

Shadow jerked away, instincts screaming at him to run.

“Chill out,” Tails whispered, ears perked up. “They don’t know that you’re here. They’re just… They’re dropping something off, that’s all. Mom and Dad are trying to get rid of them as quickly as they can.”

Shadow didn’t really relax, but he did try and force his anxiety to settle. The Wachowskis had not done anything to warrant mistrust, no matter how much he deserved it. Not yet, anyway. 

(When will you understand that you deserve nice things? Maria asked sadly.)

(Things that my family will give you, Blue added. If you only let them.)

They didn’t know what they were talking about.

The silence that they waited in was a bit awkward, but Shadow could deal. The cuff at his wrist was hurting worse than before, and for a moment he longed for the warmth of the gemstones in his jacket pocket. The Chaos Emeralds were gone, though, given back to those they belonged with.

His jacket was gone, too.

“Where’s my—”

“On the bed,” Tails said, as if he could read Shadow’s mind. 

(Heart on your sleeve, Maria teased.)

He didn’t think that was relevant.

He glanced over and, sure enough, the jacket sat folded at the foot of the bed. His book and the box containing the phone that Rouge had given him rested on top.

“I didn’t dig around in it,” Tails continued, “Since I really don’t need another lecture on privacy , but your, uh, box has been buzzing for a while.”

That was strange. Shadow didn’t quite know how phones worked, but he was sure that they needed power to function.

“It’s a phone,” he said.

“Huh,” Tails replied. “A new one?”

He nodded. “Does it not need… power?”

“It’s gotta charge, yeah,” Tails said. His voice was still quiet, but an excited lilt was added to it. “But maybe its proximity to the Chaos Emeralds for so long kept its battery filled, especially if you weren’t using it?” Shadow shook his head. “It’s interesting, regardless. Chaos Energy isn’t often used to charge small-scale devices, but then again it’s not often available in large quantities. I’ve never thought to look into it.”

Shadow wasn’t quite sure how to work one, but he knew that a phone could make noise. He did not want to risk using it while G.U.N. was around. Another few minutes passed, and the chatter below faded, replaced instead by the firm shutting of a door. Engines started outside, and Tails scurried over to the window, peering through the gaps in the curtains.

“They’re leaving,” he said as he turned back to Shadow, no longer whispering. “Mom and Dad said to wait until they’re out of town, though.”

(Smart, Maria said.)

(They’re cool like that, Blue confirmed.)

Tails kept a close eye on the screen of his device, and each second felt agonizingly long. The cuff on his wrist sent more jolts of pain through his body, and he resisted the urge to growl at it until it stopped. He didn’t think that would help much.

Finally, Tails said, “Okay! They’re gone. Now, if they come back into the town limits, I’ll get an alert. No need to worry.”

Shadow wasn’t quite sure how to respond, and so instead he said, “Sorry. For knocking out the power last night.”

(Of course that’s what you’re most worried about, Maria muttered.)

Tails snorted and waved him off. “Don’t worry about it. I kill the electricity out, like, once a week. The power grid is not built to my liking. It’s not hard to turn it back on. I’ve got an appeal with the city council in, like, two weeks to try and convince them to let me overhaul it. Wish me luck.”

(He’ll eat them alive, Blue laughed.)

Shadow wasn’t very certain what Tails was talking about. “Good luck,” he said.

“Thanks!” Tail grinned at him.

There was a knock at the door, and the little alien hopped over, pulling it open.

“Hey, sweetheart,” Maddie said in a hushed voice. She gave Tails a small pat on the head, pulling a content smile from her son. “Good morning, Shadow.” She turned her attention to him. “I hope you rested well.”

He didn’t, but it was no fault of hers, no fault of her family’s. He nodded, and if she saw through him, she didn’t mention it.

(You should tell her the truth, Maria murmured, and he ignored her.)

“Great,” Maddie said. “Well, there’s just— We’ve got something we’d like to talk with you about downstairs, and then— Well, I suppose we’ll go from there.”

Shadow wasn’t sure what they could want to talk with him about, but he could guess that it likely had to do with his breakdown from the night before. His face burned in embarrassment at the thought.

(Nothing embarrassing about having emotions, Blue clicked his tongue. Did the Moon teach you nothing?)

“Okay,” he said.

She smiled. “Meet us downstairs whenever you’re ready.”

Shadow almost went to follow her immediately, but instead drifted over to the box on top of the jacket. It was still vibrating, like Tails had said it was. He took it in his grasp and moved toward the door.

As he walked to the stairs, he pulled off the lid of the box. Inside sat the phone that Rouge had activated and given to him. It looked like the one that she had used, and nothing like those he was vaguely familiar with from the facility. He supposed fifty years could do that, like it did with the computers.

(I begged Grandfather for a blue one with polka-dots, Maria recalled.)

(Good choice, Blue said seriously.)

(He said no, Maria grumbled.)

(Lame), Blue replied.)

The vibrating stopped for a moment before picking right back up again. The screen showed Rouge’s name, along with three small pictures next to it: a bat, a diamond, and a pink heart. At the bottom, there was a green circle and a red circle.

“Oh, you’re getting a call?” Tails asked, coming up to hover next to him as he walked down the stairs.

“Am I?” Shadow scrunched his nose as he stared down at the phone. The cuff burned hotter.

“Seems like it,” Tails laughed. “You press the green button if you want to answer, the red if you want to decline. If you hold it in front of your mouth, your hearing should be good enough to pick up the sound while still letting you talk to the person who’s calling you.” Tails continued to the first floor, and Shadow followed behind.

As he rounded the corner into the sitting room, he considered what Tails had said. The box had kept buzzing, meaning that Rouge had likely tried to contact him multiple times. 

(You should answer it, Maria said.)

(Yeah! Blue agreed. What if she needs help?)

He huffed, hoped that it was important, and answered the call, holding the phone just as the little alien had instructed him.

“Hello?” He asked, ignoring the Wachowskis as they stared at him.

“Shadow!” Rouge’s voice exclaimed, loud and relieved, and he winced at the volume. “Oh, thank Gaia, you’re okay!”

“I’d hope you’d have more faith in me than that,” he replied.

“Oh, you know I do, ” she said. “But not important right now, hun. It’s the cuff!”

As if it knew that it was being talked about, another wave of agony shot through his body from the Chaos Blocker.

“What?” He asked. The hairs on the back of his neck raised. The air turned. Something was off . “What’s the cuff? What are you talking about?”

“The tracker!” Rouge cried. “The one the officers used to find us! I never had it! It was the cuff, Shadow, it’s in the cuff!”

Shing.

(Watch out! Maria cried.)

Blue’s family yelled and dived out of the way, but he wasn’t as lucky. Something hit him between the shoulder-blades, sending him flying forward and through the window, into their backyard.

“An accomplice?” A voice asked. 

“Accomplices,” another said.

“No,” the first replied. “An accomplice, and witnesses.”

The Chaos Blocker sent another wave of pain through his body, but Shadow pushed himself off of the ground, spitting out dirt onto the grass.

(Ew, Blue said.)

“No need to fight,” the first voice said. Of all the aliens he had fought, these looked the most boring. They were all dressed in dark clothes, masks covering their mouths. The two at the front were the only unique ones, with purple trim rather than black. “It’ll only hurt more if you do.”

“For me or you?” Shadow asked, pushing past the Blocker’s effects for the Chaos Energy surging in his blood. “‘Cause I already know the answer. Care to find out?”

He flashed behind one of them and kicked them in the head before they could react. The rest scattered, and he scowled, appearing behind another and delivering a similar blow.

The fight was a bit of a blur. Shadow’s body ached more with each use of Chaos Energy, and he wished that he could just rip the Blocker off and let it take him and all of these aliens out.

“Is that the Echidna?” One of the aliens screeched.

There was a bit of yellow and red in the corner of his vision, Blue’s brothers working to help, and he banished any thoughts of letting his Energy blow and take everyone around him with it. He couldn’t do anything more to harm this family. Not after everything.

“Knuckles!” He heard Tails yell. “Any identification?”

“West Draffini Mercenaries,” Knuckles replied over the chaos. “From Planet Draffin.”

(Ah, yes, of course, Maria said. Clears everything up.)

“Great!” Tails shot overhead, distracting Shadow long enough to earn him a kick to the side. “You ready for some base-of-ball?”

“Need you even ask, Fox?” 

Knuckles began to dart around the yard that was rapidly being destroyed, picking up sluggish mercenaries and flinging them through a ring portal that Tails flicked open. Shadow continued to do his part, taking out as many of the aliens as he could.

Eventually, though, one managed to get the better of him. Before he could flash away, he was jabbed between the ribs. The real pain came a moment later when electricity coursed through his body. For a moment, he wasn’t at the Wachowskis’ home anymore, but rather in the fiery ruins of the facility, being herded back into a cage as the soldiers left Maria’s body to burn.

He blinked back to the present only to be shocked again and brought to the ground.

“Shadow!” Tails called, and he looked over just in time to watch the yellow alien be trapped in a net. Knuckles raced over to try and free him, and the mercenaries took the opportunity to press their advantage.

“You know Vice?” One of them, the first one that had ever spoken, asked.

Shadow grit his teeth. “If fighting counts as knowing.”

The mercenary chuckled. “Looks like he was tellin’ the truth, then. A black and red hedgehog, helpin’ out the Bat. Where is she?”

(The price of being too cool, Blue mourned.)

“We split up,” Shadow said. “I don’t know where she is.”

The second mercenary shrugged. “Proven accomplices go for a good price, anyhow.”

“You think you can contain me?” Shadow asked. Chaos Energy flickered over his quills and he tried to force his limbs to cooperate. “I’d love to see it.”

Another shock. 

“You know,” the second mused, “On the right planet, they’ll take even an accomplice dead or alive.”

“Well,” the first said, drawing a long blade, “Ain’t that convenient?”

“Knuckles!” Tails yelped. His brother had not managed to get him out of the net. “You have to help Shadow! Knuckles!”

The red alien turned to look at him, eyes wide, but he wasn’t fast like Shadow was or Blue had been. He wouldn’t make it in time.

Shadow tried to channel his Chaos Energy. Whether it was to teleport or even just get a boost of speed to move out of the way, he didn’t know, but the electricity combined with the Blocker made his abilities disoriented, to say the least. The Energy would not respond to his calls, no matter how desperately he tried to reach for it.

It was one thing to be at peace with—to welcome—your own death, and another entirely to watch as it descended. It was strange to know that there would be no more chances like there had been in the facility. There were no scientists to pump him full of Energy and stitch him back together and push his healing to the very limits. There was just his pounding heart in his chest, useless sparking Chaos Energy, and the blood in his veins that would be spilled across the grass. He was mortal, just as Maria had been, just as Blue had been, just as he was meant to be.

(No! Blue yelled.)

(No! Maria wailed.)

“Sonic!” Tails screamed.

There was a beat, in which the only thing that he could hear was how his own breath caught in his lungs.

Then, the air cracked, and it was split in half by a flash of cobalt that struck the two mercenaries and flung them away. A ring portal opened to Shadow’s left, and the mercenaries were sent soaring back through it before it clicked closed behind them.

(Yes! Maria exclaimed, relief in her voice.)

He coughed and pushed himself to his feet. He let air force its way into his lungs as his body shook off the remnants of the electricity.

Finally, Shadow looked up, his ears ringing.

His heart skipped a beat, stuttering in his chest, and he felt as if all of the breath had been sucked right back out of his body.

(Oh, Maria said, voice impossibly soft. Sonic.)

There, standing in the grass on trembling legs, bandaged and bruised and alive, was Blue. He looked tired, but his eyes were just as bright as they were in their permanent spot in the back of Shadow’s mind.

Their gazes met, and Blue’s—Sonic’s—eyes widened, his mouth falling open. “Shadow?” He asked, as if he couldn’t quite believe what he was seeing.

“Sonic,” Shadow said, and the name felt right on his tongue.

(There you are, Blue breathed.)

Nestled in his ribcage, next to a heart that might burst, Shadow’s soul sang.

Chapter Text

Shadow didn’t know what to say. 

Sonic didn’t seem to have the same problem.

“Oh, my god, you’re alive.” Despite the bandages and unsteady stance, the blue alien was on him in a flash, flinging his arms around Shadow and holding onto him as if they were the only two things in the world. “Dude, I thought you were dead. I thought you’d died and I’d— We’d never—” He let out a shaky breath. “I’m so glad you’re alive.”

Shadow stood still for a moment, trying to process, before he slowly returned the embrace. As soon as his arms were around Sonic’s back, the other slumped, as if his strength had drained.

In the recesses of his mind, Maria and Blue were quiet.

“Is everyone okay?” Tom’s voice came from behind them. They turned together as he and Maddie carefully made their way through the hole in the house. “Oh, Tails, buddy, hang on. I’ll grab something from the garage to get you out.”

As Tom moved toward the larger of the two buildings across the yard, Maddie’s eyes flicked over Tails and Knuckles, then the damage, and then finally to Sonic and Shadow.

“Sonic!” She exclaimed. “Are you all right? You shouldn’t be out of bed!”

Her son grinned. “It’s okay,” he said cheekily. “He’s got me, don’t you, Shads?”

Shadow jerked a bit at the nickname but nodded. “Yes. I do.”

Maddie huffed, though a smile pulled at her lips. “I mean you shouldn’t be tossing aliens through portals.”

“Oh, so it’s fine when Knuckles does it, but when I do, all of a sudden—”

“Knuckles didn’t just get brought home from the hospital,” she interjected sternly. “G.U.N.’s barely left the city and you’re already making an effort to call them again and cart you back off.”

Sonic’s eyes widened. “No! Don’t send me back to the hospital, Mom, they don’t even have chili dogs.”

There was a joke in his tone, but a bit of true desperation there too, and Shadow tightened his grip on the other without even thinking about it. Though he didn’t mention it, Sonic squeezed back.

“Your priorities are ridiculous,” Maddie sighed. Tom reemerged from the garage, a set of clippers in hand, and set to work freeing Tails from the net.

As the family’s focus turned to that task, Shadow’s thoughts finally caught back up with the present.

Blue’s commentary, a constant companion, was gone. He wondered if it was because the real Blue, as brilliant and breathing and alive as he was meant to be, was still secure in his hold. He was here, he was living, and he had been the whole time. Blue’s family had been telling Shadow the whole time, and he hadn’t even known it.

“It’s you,” he murmured. “You’re Sonic.”

The blue alien grinned widely. “Sure am! Not a clone or anything—at least I don’t think I am.”

Shadow closed his eyes and breathed as deeply as he could with lungs that didn’t quite remember how to work. There was Chaos Energy in the other, lively and warm and familiar, and completely and utterly irreplaceable.

“You’re not,” he managed to say. The cuff on his wrist sent out a fresh wave of pain. “You’re you.”

“Right back atcha!” Sonic reached up and rubbed a thumb over Shadow’s cheek, as if they’d known each other their whole lives. In a strange way, they had. “God, dude, I thought you were dead. You should be dead. How did you survive that? Didn’t the Cannon, like, blow up?”

Shadow raised an eyebrow. “I had those—those Emeralds. The better question is how did you survive, though I suppose it looks as though you barely did.”

Sonic waved him off, despite the bandages looped around his chest and left side. “No, these are mostly from the Cannon’s laser and the lack of oxygen and everything. The fall only caused a few bruises. Knux and Tails came after me and used a ring to portal us back to the ground.” He jumped away from Shadow and spread his arms out, smiling widely. “It takes more than that to get rid of Sonic the—” His face dropped, and he swayed. “Oh, okay, nope, I’m going down—”

Shadow zipped over, catching Sonic as his knees buckled.

“Apparently all it takes is jumping a total of one time,” he said dryly.

Sonic laughed, bright despite the strain, and patted him on the back of the shoulder. “Nah,” he said. “I can be more careful than that. I just knew you’d catch me.” 

Shadow refused to think about the way his heart pounded. “You’re an idiot.”

“And yet you’re stuck with me,” Sonic hummed. “Whatever will we do?”

“Okay, okay,” Maddie chuckled as she approached. “As fun as this has been, you, young man, need to be resting.” 

Sonic gave her big eyes. “On the couch?”

She stared at him for a long moment before clicking her tongue and saying, “I suppose that can be arranged.”

“Knuckles, help your brother inside for me, would you?” Tom asked, brandishing his cast. “I’m not particularly primed for lugging around any Blue Devils at the moment.”

“It’s fine,” Shadow said. He was still holding Sonic up, keeping him from falling to the ground, and he didn’t think that he could let go yet. “I can do it.”

Tom blinked, but Maddie’s lips curled into a smile. “Perfect. Come along, then, boys.”

There was a moment where Sonic protested, but Shadow ignored him, sweeping under the other alien’s legs and lifting until he had him in a comfortable carry. Despite the ache in his limbs from the Blocker, it felt almost natural.

Sonic cleared his throat. “Uh, away then, noble steed!” He declared. “To the couch!”

Shadow rolled his eyes but started to walk, allowing himself to revel in the feeling of Sonic—of Blue—secure in his arms. That part of his soul that was frayed and broken still ached, but light shined on it again, soft and sweet, and was gently teaching it to heal.

He kicked his shoes to activate them as they reached the hole in the house and easily levitated over the debris. It drew Tails’s attention as he touched down next to them and drifted toward the living room.

“Where did you get those, by the way?” He asked eagerly. “They’re powered with your Chaos Energy, right?”

“Help me channel it,” Shadow nodded, despite the squirming in his gut. “The G.U.N. scientists gave them to me.”

Tails opened his mouth to ask something more, but Sonic reached over and whacked his brother on the shoulder. “C’mon, little bro, leave the guy alone. I’m hungry. I’m tired. I wanna watch a movie. You’ll have plenty of time to ask questions later.”

Though he didn’t voice it, Shadow appreciated the gesture. He didn’t really want to think about the facility for the moment, or why G.U.N. had given him his air shoes, or how when he’d first gotten them it had been because he woke up to find them strapped to his feet with no way to take them off.

Sonic seemed to understand, tossing a smile back at Shadow, smaller than usual but no less genuine, and he forced back the ache in his throat to follow Tails.

He deposited Sonic on the couch once they entered the living room. The moment that he hit the cushion, Sonic reached out and grabbed Shadow’s wrist, yanking him down next to him. The cuff thrummed. Tails disappeared through the basement door with a quick mention of checking the electricity thrown over his shoulder.

“So, the Emeralds,” Sonic said, breezing right past everything even as Shadow thought his face might burn off. “We were wondering where those were.”

“I’ve returned them to your brother,” Shadow forced out. “The red one.”

“Well, I bet you two are besties now, then,” Sonic laughed. “He’s real intense about those. I get it, though. He’s, like, the last Echidna, and protecting the Master Emerald was their whole thing.”

“Here we are,” Maddie said, sliding into the room with two glasses in hand, a large bowl balanced between her arms. She placed down the glasses filled with water on the table in front of the couch before passing the bowl to her son. “You don’t have to finish—”

“Oh, we will,” Sonic said easily. Shadow glanced down at the bowl. It was filled with fruit, ones that he had seen but never tried. They were small and round, and a variety of colors. “Thanks, Mom!”

She smiled at him. “Of course. Now, if you’re all set, I’m gonna go call the construction company.” A sigh. “Again.”

Shadow glanced at Sonic as she walked away. “‘Again?’”

“Yeah.” Sonic popped one of the fruits into his mouth. “First there was when Eggman—uh, the younger Robotnik—first came and kinda shot up the place. Then, like a year later, Knuckles showed up and, well, he was allied with Eggman when we first met him, and he thought I knew where the Master Emerald was, so he punched me through the wall.”

Shadow blinked. “He tried to kill you and now he’s your brother?”

Sonic shrugged. “He was confused. And hurting. And alone.” He smiled, but there was an air of sadness to it, and when his eyes met Shadow’s they gleamed like emeralds. “We all know what that’s like.” He ate another one of the fruits and reached for the remote control propped against a pillow. “He helped us stop Eggman, and we decided that it would— Well, it would be better if we worked together to protect the Master Emerald. It was kinda a weird roommate situation at first, but eventually…” He snickered. “You should’ve seen Maddie’s face when Knux called her ‘Mother’ for the first time. You should’ve seen Tom’s face.”

 “His idea of protecting the Emerald is giving it to that—” He tried to think of a good word.

(Dolt, Maria suggested, speaking up for the first time in a while.)

“-Dolt of an officer?”

“Hey.” Sonic shoved his shoulder playfully. “Wade’s a good guy. He’s, like, Knuckles’s apprentice or something? I don’t know, they went on this whole adventure and nobody told us it was happening so we kinda just thought he was never coming back and— Yeah, it was a lot. Wade’s great, though.”

“Great enough to be the sole protector of a jewel of that power?” Shadow asked.

Sonic clicked his tongue, just like Maddie had earlier. Shadow wondered if he’d learned it from her. “Maybe not. It’s Knuckles’s sacred duty, though, you know?” He picked another fruit and held the bowl out to Shadow. “You want one?”

“I don’t know what those are.”

Sonic’s eyes widened. “You don’t—” He cut himself off, looking away for a moment. “Right. Uh, they’re berries! Good selection, too. We’ve got strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and blackberries in here. Mom got me on ‘em. Turns out what’s good for one hedgehog is generally good for any, even cross-species.”

Shadow took one of the berries between his fingers. A strawberry, if he saw Sonic’s pointing correctly.

(Oh, those were some of my favorites, Maria chirped.)

(I prefer blueberries, Blue said, even though he was sitting right next to Shadow. For obvious reasons.)

Carefully, he bit into the end of it, prepared for it to taste like ash just as the food from the previous night had. Instead, it was sweet and juicy, what he assumed must be the flavor of sunshine filling his mouth. 

It must have shown on his face. Sonic grinned, and there was sunshine in his smile too. “Not bad, huh?”

Shadow managed to finish the strawberry calmly and, in an even more impressive show of strength, did not raid the bowl for every remaining one. Instead, he took another one in his grasp and asked, “What did you mean by that? What’s good for one hedgehog is good for any?” His arm twitched as a new bout of pain coursed through it.

“Well, you know-” Sonic waved his hand through the air- “Hedgehogs on Earth can have berries. They give ‘em vitamins and stuff. Mom knows more about it than I do. Either way, turns out they’re pretty good for hedgehogs like us, too. Even better , we can have way more of them than Earth ones can, ‘cause of the whole better metabolism and different digestive system and everything. Tails made a bunch of diagrams.”

He narrowed his eyes. “We’re not hedgehogs. We’re aliens.”

Sonic stared at him as if he was stupid. “Uh, dude, we’re both. Like, yeah, we’re not Earth hedgehogs, but we’re still hedgehogs. It’s like how Tails is a fox and Knuckles is an echidna. We’re all Mobians, and you and I are Hedgehog Mobians.”

(I don’t get it, Maria said.)

Shadow was inclined to agree with her. It didn’t make any sense. “ How does that happen? Having life develop on two completely different planets with that similar biology? With the same names?”

“Well, the names are probably because of interplanetary travel,” Sonic said. “But I don’t know about the biology thing. Tails probably does. You’d have to ask him.”

“Ask me what?” The little alien in question emerged from the basement with his goggles still on his head, flicking the door closed with one of his tails. “Power should be good, by the way. We didn’t hit anything vital.”

Sonic pumped his fist in victory. “Shads was just asking about how there could be, like, Earth hedgehogs and Mobian hedgehogs with such similar biology even though they developed on different planets.”

“Oh!” Tails grinned, hopping into one of the armchairs after stealing a handful of berries from the bowl. “I was wondering the same thing when I first got to Earth! I don’t have a definitive answer, but my best guess is that both Mobius and Earth were essentially fertilized with ‘seeds of life’ from the same origin. We generally use the same amino acids—building blocks for protein—as well as the same nucleobases—that’s the stuff that makes DNA and RNA. There are a bunch of other commonalities that don’t make much sense otherwise.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “It doesn’t really matter how it all came to be, but it’s interesting, you know?”

Even though there was a bit of confusion clear on his face, Sonic grinned anyway. “Thanks, li’l bro.” He raised his voice. “Hey, Knux! Stop sucking up to Mom and Dad and bring the popcorn!”

A few moments later, the red alien entered the room, staring down his nose at his brother. “You’re only jealous that my superior behavior in helping with the damage places me as the favored child.”

Sonic barked a laugh. “Dude, I was here first! I get seniority.”

“Cuteness factor,” Tails added, pointing to himself.

All eyes turned to Shadow and he resisted the urge to curl in on himself. “Don’t look at me. I could kill everyone in this room without blinking.”

“You wouldn’t, though,” Sonic said, pressing against his side as if it was simple.

No. He wouldn’t.

Shadow frowned as the cuff pushed against his Energy again, gritting his teeth as agony shot through his body.

“You’re in pain, New Hedgehog,” Knuckles said.

Tails glanced up at his brother. “Little late to the party there, Knux.”

Knuckles huffed. “Physically.”

(Finally! Blue exclaimed.)

Sonic eyed Shadow. “Are you?”

“I’m fine,” he said.

“I have seen enough attempts to hide an injury to know what it looks like,” Knuckles said. “Your muscles are tense, your limbs twitch—your left arm in particular—and your movements are slowed.”

“All of which could be attributed to a certain amount of… emotional turmoil,” Tails mumbled. 

Sonic bumped him gently in the shoulder. “You don’t have to lie to us. If you’re injured, just say it. We can help.”

(Do it, Maria murmured. Let them help.)

“I’m not injured,” Shadow managed to say. His voice was scratchy. The other didn’t mention it. “It’s this—this cuff.” He shook the offending wrist.

Tails made a small noise of confusion. “Have your inhibitors always caused you pain?”

Knuckles took a step closer, placing the bowl of popcorn on the table. “That is not an inhibitor,” he said. “It is a Chaos Blocker.”

The excitement in Tails’s gasp was a stark contrast to the next wave of pain the cuff sent through his blood. “A Chaos Blocker? Oh Gaia, I’ve only ever dreamed about seeing one! Where did you get one?”

“Fight,” Shadow replied.

(Sure, be the most vague you can, Blue said sarcastically. I’m sure they can figure it out.)

“Not by choice, then,” Knuckles said.

Shadow shot him a glare. “What do you think?”

“I can probably get it off,” Tails said, the eagerness in his voice a bit more tempered. “I’ve read a lot about their manufacturing and the way that they work. Even something that limits Chaos Energy is interesting, but a Blocker—” He cut himself off. “Anyway. I’ll remove it, especially if it’s causing you pain. Just let me grab my tools.”

“No,” Shadow said, closing his other hand over the cuff. It was hot to the touch. “I don’t have my other inhibitor. If this comes off without it, this town would be wiped off of the map.” He wasn’t quite sure of how true that was, but he didn’t want to risk it. His Chaos Energy was angry at being contained, and it only grew angrier the longer it was. Sonic was at his side, alive, and he couldn’t lose that. Not now.

The little alien shifted back, his ears drooping. He pulled at a tuft of fur on one of his tails. “That… changes things. I’m sure I can make an inhibitor, but… They’re complicated. I’ll need to build some new tech in order to even try to construct one. It might take a while.”

“That’s fine,” Shadow said, instead of any of the other things he could.

(It’s not fine, Maria sighed, but she knew as well as he did that there weren’t any other options.)

“Uh,” Sonic cut in slowly, “I might actually have a solution.” He pushed himself off of the couch, swaying almost immediately. Shadow reached out to steady him, and Sonic held onto his arm for a moment before saying, “B.R.B.” He zipped away in a flash of blue and reappeared a few seconds later, looking just a bit worse for wear. He all-but-collapsed onto the couch next to Shadow, but held out a glinting gold ring. His missing inhibitor. “Ta-da.”

“Where did you get this?” Shadow asked, taking it in his hands. It was a bit scuffed, likely from the fall to Earth, but it was certainly his. He could see a little dent in it from when he and Maria crashed into a wall while skating, a lifetime ago. That memory had always made this ring his favorite.

(You were stuck in the tube for two weeks, Maria reminded him.)

Worth it.

“Stole it from G.U.N.,” Sonic said, and didn’t elaborate. “Can you get that thing off now, Tails?”

“Of course!” Tails exclaimed. He half-walked half-floated to the basement door, flinging it open and disappearing downstairs. Only a few moments passed before he reemerged, a tool-belt secured around his waist. He skipped over to where Shadow was. “Your arm, please,” he said, sounding as if he was trying to be as professional as possible.

“Wait just a sec,” Sonic said. He opened the inhibitor ring and took Shadow’s hand in his, snapping it onto his wrist just behind the silver Chaos Blocker. “There we go.” He smiled at Shadow, the corners of his eyes scrunching. “All yours, Tails.”

The fox worked quickly and efficiently, which Shadow appreciated. He didn’t watch, not interested in seeing any tools near his body that might look anything like those the scientists had used on him. Sonic seemed to pick up on it, taking Shadow’s free hand in his and rambling nonsense about the different movies they had to pick from. Shadow didn’t recognize a single title, but he allowed himself to simply zone out and enjoy the sound of Sonic’s voice, so-very-real and within reach.

A faint click and a weight disappeared from Shadow’s wrist and from his being. His breath hitched, and he felt his Chaos Energy shift before roaring. It raged through his body, flickering over his quills, and he did his best to convince his lungs to continue to draw in air. Eventually, the inhibitors did as they were meant to, and the Chaos Energy calmed down once it found nothing to actually react to.

“You good?” Sonic asked as his heartbeat started to slow. Their hands were still intertwined.

Shadow nodded. “Yes.” He turned to Tails. “Thank you.”

“No problem!” Tails laughed. “What are friends for?” He held out the Chaos Blocker. “Here you go.”

(Begone, cuff! Blue proclaimed.)

Shadow stopped a growl from building in his throat at the sight of it. “You keep it,” he said. “I don’t want it.”

“Really?” Tails gasped. There looked to be stars in his eyes. “Really really?”

“Yes.” Shadow glared at the cuff. “You should get rid of the tracker, though.”

“Tracker?” Tails echoed.

“That’s how those… aliens found us. There’s a tracker in the cuff.”

Knuckles nodded sagely. “The West Draffini Mercenaries are just one of many groups known for purchasing signals for available trackers. If you know the right people and the right places to look, you can locate one anywhere in the galaxy.”

(Not at all concerning, Blue muttered.)

Tails’s face screwed up. “Yeah, okay. I’ll get on that. I need something to do while the movie is on, anyway.”

“Speaking of which , what are we watching?” Sonic turned to Shadow. “Did any of them pique your interest?”

Shadow hadn’t really been paying attention to anything beyond the sound of Sonic’s voice. The words had mostly escaped him. He searched desperately for an answer, and settled on the only movie title he could remember. “Uh, Speed?”

Knuckles and Tails both put their faces in their hands as Sonic squealed. “Oh, be still my beating heart! Are those wedding bells I hear?” He shook Shadow by the arm. “Great choice, great choice!” The bewilderment on his face must have been clear as Sonic added, “That’s my favorite movie, dude. It’s a Keanu classic.”

“‘Keanu?’”

“His most beloved film star,” Knuckles clarified. “He once managed to speak on him for fifty minutes without a single pause.”

“Excuse you, it was fifty-three,” Sonic said. “And I can’t help it if he’s a national treasure. Oh, we should watch National Treasure.” His brothers both perked up only to deflate when he continued, “Some other time. For now—”

Sonic, remote in hand, turned on the television and deftly navigated the options on the screen. It looked markedly more advanced than the one from the inn. Eventually, the movie was playing, after about four minutes of arguing over settings and ‘what size the subtitles should be.’ Sonic settled back and silently passed another strawberry to Shadow, who took it without comment.

The movie was good. It was very different from the films that he had watched with Maria. It looked more realistic, and he supposed newer cameras were probably better quality. The effects were impressive too, and he wondered how the amount of trivia Sonic knew for it even managed to fit in his brain.

(I am more skilled than you know, Blue said.)

The afternoon slipped by, and as the movie finished and the Wachowski siblings began to debate which one they would put on next, Maddie and Tom entered the room.

“They’ll be out tomorrow to look at the wall and give us an estimate,” Maddie said. “I almost wish it was Eggman who did it this time, just so we could convince G.U.N. to pay for it.”

“I’m sorry,” Shadow said. “They were tracking me. If I hadn’t—”

“Oh, it’s not your fault, kiddo.” She waved him off. Sonic’s hand was on Shadow’s arm, holding tight, as if he was afraid that he would disappear. “Sometimes we get chased by alien mercenaries. It happens.”

(Often? Maria asked.)

“I’ve disabled the tracker,” Tails added, holding up the half-disassembled Chaos Blocker. “So no more alien mercenaries are gonna be called here any time soon.”

“Speaking of-” Tom drew something from his pocket and tossed it to Shadow- “Your phone. It didn’t really make it through the, uh, wall breaking, but we can bring it downtown and get it checked out.”

Shadow looked down at the shattered screen. “Thank you,” he said, and placed the broken phone on the side table. It didn’t really look like something that anyone would be able to fix. Without it, he had no way to contact Rouge, and no way to ever find her again. The thought made his chest hurt.

(It’ll be fine , Maria crooned. You’ll see her again. Don’t worry.)

She had no way of knowing that. Shadow would never see Maria again, after all.

(You saw me again, though, Blue pointed out.)

Shadow thought that Blue—Sonic—was a bit of a special case. He wanted to hope that he would see Rouge again, but hope had never really done him much good.

“What was that movie you talked about earlier?” Shadow asked, voice a bit raspy. “The one like your film star?”

“Oh, National Treasure! Yeah, we should watch that one. ‘We’re gonna steal the Declaration of Independence.’ It’s great,” Sonic said.

“It’s a heist?”

“Kinda. It’s like… an adventure movie,” Sonic explained. “But yeah, there’s a heist in it.”

Shadow hummed. “Are those meant to be exciting?”

“Uh, yeah? Like, breaking into a place, stealing something precious, sneaking your way through guards and security cameras and traps. The heist in London was exciting, wasn’t it?”

“That was a G.U.N. base, that’s different,” Shadow insisted. “It isn’t that difficult to steal things.”

“Well, maybe not, like, shoplifting, but—”

“I stole a diamond,” he cut in.

“A diamond?” Maddie asked, the first to recover.

Shadow nodded. “From a— some sort of gallery in—in the City of Wind?”

(Windy City, Maria said.)

There was a beat of silence and then Tom snorted. “Wait, wait, wait, you’re the one who stole the Tiffany Diamond in Chicago a few days back. That was you?”

“It was part of a deal,” Shadow said. “To get transport here.”

“That does not seem like a fair trade-off, Shads.” Sonic’s gaze flicked over him. “Do you, like, have it on you?”

“No.”

“Oh. Lame.”

They went through National Treasure and were treated to Knuckles’s judgement of any action scene that played, and then a musical movie called Wicked, which Tails sang along to the entire time, complete with personal choreography. 

Between each movie, they were given more food, which Shadow found himself actually able to appreciate. What he didn’t appreciate was how they were also all made to take turns in the shower, washing off the dirt from the fight in the yard earlier.

He understood why they had to. He didn’t have to like it.

(C’mon, Maria teased. Showers aren’t so bad.)

They weren’t, but they still reminded him of the ones in the facility, of searing heat and freezing cold. He didn’t know how to make the stinging under his skin stop otherwise, though, and so he turned the hot water as high as it would go, just like back at the inn, and gritted his teeth until he was done.

He shook himself off and returned to the living room, taking his place beside Sonic again and trying not to think about how his proximity to the other made the stinging fade into the background.

Eventually, Maddie snatched the remote from the arm of the couch and turned off the television as the credits for the third movie played. Groans arose, but she shook her head firmly. “I don’t think so. It’s time for bed, and we’ve had an exciting day, some of us more than others.” She looked pointedly at Sonic. “Everyone up.”

They filed into a bathroom, Maddie pressing a ‘toothbrush’ into Shadow’s hand, which Knuckles explained how to use as if it was a weapon. Once their teeth were taken care of, the group split. Knuckles headed toward the back door, stating that he would be watching over the household from his ‘guard’s quarters’ for the evening.

“His room’s the shed,” Tom explained. “By request. He feels more comfortable being able to watch for intruders from there.”

Tails went back to the basement, which apparently doubled as both his workshop and his bedroom since he’d fallen asleep while doing a project one-too-many times, convincing his parents to just move his bed down there, too.

Shadow was led upstairs, following behind Sonic to make sure that he didn’t fall. 

“Here,” Maddie said, gesturing Shadow toward the door to the room that he had woken up in earlier. “This’ll be your room. We can figure out the details later, but you’re welcome to do whatever you’d like with it.”

(A room! Maria cheered. One of your own! All for you!)

He swallowed. He felt a bit sick. “Thank you.”

“Of course,” she smiled. “Tom and I are right down the hall.”

“And I’m in the attic!” Sonic exclaimed, standing with one foot on the ladder. Tom hovered near him, ready to help him up if need be.

“Okay,” Shadow said. He met Sonic’s eyes, almost glowing faintly in the dark hallway, and added, “Good night.”

“‘Night, Shads,” Sonic replied.

Tom and Maddie gave their pleasantries as well and Shadow pushed his way into his assigned room, quickly closing the door behind him. Kicking off his shoes, he sat down on the bed next to his still-folded jacket and listened as the creaking through the rest of the house slowly faded into nothing, everyone else settling down for the night.

Shadow laid back, staring up at the ceiling. It wasn’t bumpy like the inn’s had been, but rather smooth. It made it less interesting to look at.

He had no way of knowing how much time was passing. At one point, he got up and pulled open the curtains, letting him see outside. He could catch the edge of a yellow streetlamp a good distance away, glowing faintly through the trees. From his angle, there was no way to see the stars, and he wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.

Maria and Blue were relatively quiet, but he supposed that was because his thoughts weren’t very coherent. There was a steady ringing in his ears, a buzzing in his head, and phantom pain in his limbs, as if his body hadn’t quite realized that the Chaos Blocker was gone yet.

After an eternity and no time at all, Shadow sat up.

Blue was alive, wasn’t he?

He must be. Shadow had seen him earlier, had felt his heartbeat and heard his breathing and reveled in the way their souls sang in tune. 

When he closed his eyes, though, he could still feel that piece of his very being that was frayed and broken and raw, and there was no light that shined on it, no gentle touch setting it right.

He had to check, just to make sure. Just to know.

Shadow slipped from the bed and shoved his feet back into his shoes. He opened the door and, as quietly as he could, padded over to the ladder that led up to Blue’s room. He was halfway up when the trap door at the top opened.

“Oh,” Sonic said, voice low. “Fancy meeting you here.”

“I had to check,” Shadow said, as if that was enough explanation.

Apparently, it was. Sonic smiled softly, sadly. “Me too.” He backed away a bit and then waved Shadow up. “C’mon. It’s probably better you come up here than I try and make my way down.”

Shadow agreed. He quickly made his way up the rest of the ladder and crawled into the attic, Sonic closing the door behind him.

From what he had seen of the cave that he used to stay in, Sonic’s room was about what he would have expected. It was more lived-in, certainly, but every aspect of it still screamed Blue.

“Like what you see?” Sonic asked, spreading his arms out. 

It was obvious that he was talking about the room. Shadow wasn’t when he replied, “Yes.”

There was silence for a moment, during which they simply stared at one another. Shadow didn’t think he would ever turn away. 

“Okay,” Sonic finally said, breaking away. “I think if I don’t sit down soon, I’m gonna pass out, so let’s…” He glanced up, and then said, “Let’s go outside.”

Shadow helped Sonic scramble onto the roof through the window in the ceiling, climbing up another ladder that he wasn’t quite sure was meant to be there. Still, they made it on top of the house, and the tiles shielded them from any of the lights below, allowing for a perfect view of the night sky.

They were quiet for a long bit, sitting on the roof of the Wachowski home and staring up at the stars. Sonic grabbed Shadow’s hand as they first sat down and didn’t let go. Shadow wasn’t quite sure who Sonic was trying to ground. He didn’t think it mattered.

“I thought you were dead,” Sonic finally said.

“I know,” Shadow replied. “I thought you were dead.”

“I know.” A thumb rubbed against his palm slowly. “I didn’t… It was weird.” Sonic laughed weakly. “We barely— I barely knew you, and I was— God, I was mourning like— As if I’d—”

“Lost a part of yourself,” Shadow finished.

A beat. “Yeah,” Sonic breathed. “That.”

“It was the Emeralds, I think,” Shadow said. “At least partly.”

“Makes sense. They’re weird.”

“I thought—” Shadow cut himself off. “It felt like there was a piece of myself missing,” he said. “I couldn’t even— Losing Maria was different. I can’t— I don’t know why— It was different. I’d never…” He swallowed. “No one ever understood. I never knew anyone like me, I didn’t even— I didn’t think there was anyone like me, let alone someone who—who knew—” He choked on his words. “And then you— The Emeralds were trying to go back to you, and I wouldn’t let them, and I didn’t even— I couldn’t even catch you as you fell.”

“You had to save the world,” Sonic shrugged. “Even if I had died—which I didn’t—I’d get it. I’d forgive you.”

Shadow’s hand that wasn’t linked with Sonic’s balled into a fist. “But I wouldn’t.”

A steady breeze floated by, tickling his ears and rustling the leaves of the trees around the house. A million diamonds twinkled overhead, and Shadow thought of the Moon, of how the star shines, even when the light is gone. 

Sonic’s star was bold and brilliant and breathtaking, and Shadow didn’t deserve to bask in its light. He didn’t deserve its care or its forgiveness. He couldn’t figure out what was so difficult to understand about that.

“Hey.” Sonic nudged him. Shadow met his eyes, because even though he didn’t deserve to, he was selfish, and he would take any chance he could to gaze at emeralds that were still as bright as they were meant to be. “It’s okay.”

Shadow set his jaw. “I—”

“I get to make the choice to forgive you if I want to,” Sonic cut him off. “And I do. You should forgive yourself too, but… Well, I know sometimes it’s… It can be hard.” He gave Shadow a smile, gentle and loving, like the one from their time on the Moon, as the stars shimmered and the Sun rose in the distance. “But you’re here. I’m here. We’re together now, okay? And apparently it’s gonna take a planet-destroying laser to break us apart, so good luck getting rid of me.” 

Sonic sighed and leaned back, lying down on the roof tiles. Shadow followed him without a second thought. The other shifted his position until his head was pressed against Shadow’s shoulder.

“You don’t have to forgive yourself, yet,” Sonic murmured. “We can work on it. Take it one step at a time, you know? Even if we have to go slow.” Shadow couldn’t help his snort, and felt a chuckle against his side. “I know, I’m shocked I said it too.” Sonic hummed and fell quiet for a moment. “But I mean it. It might… It could take a bit, but it’ll be okay. We’ll be okay.” He waved a hand through the air. “We’ve got all the time in the world to figure it out.”

A cloud floated by and revealed the Moon beyond, not quite whole but still gleaming in the sky, despite everything.

Shadow tightened his hold on the hand in his, and felt Sonic squeeze back, bandaged and bright and breathing.

We’ve got all the time in the world.

He liked the sound of that.

Chapter Text

Shadow woke to the sound of birds.

He blinked slowly, his mind trying to make its way out of the fog of sleep and into reality.

The sun had risen, pale light brushing the treetops but not quite reaching the roof of the Wachowski house. 

He could feel a layer of dew on the tiles as his leg moved, a stark coolness against the warmth of the rest of his body. Blue fur faded into his vision. He felt the weight of something around his side.

Shadow and Sonic were curled up together, arms thrown indiscriminately over one another as they stayed close. Beneath his fingers, Shadow could measure a quick heartbeat, steady and strong. Shoulders moved with even breathing. 

He closed his eyes for a moment and allowed himself to enjoy the feeling. There was little doubt that Blue was there, that he was alive. Shadow could feel a careful touch gently stitching his soul back together. 

Sonic grumbled and shifted. Shadow loosened his hold, but did not let go, and a moment later bleary emerald eyes flicked up to meet his own.

“‘Morning,” Sonic said, giving him a lazy smile, voice scratchy with sleep.

“Good morning,” Shadow responded. There was a rasp to his words, too. “Apologies. I did not intend to fall asleep.”

“Nah, I’ve done it more times than I can count, dude.” Sonic still hadn’t pulled away. Neither of them mentioned it. “You sleep well?”

“I didn’t have any… dreams,” he replied.

“You mean nightmares?” 

Shadow’s face heated at being caught so easily. “Yes. No nightmares.”

“Good.” Sonic yawned and stretched a bit, his face rubbing against Shadow’s shoulder as he did. “None here, either. Which is nice. Been a while.”

Shadow understood. He had been in a nightmare that felt endless until he woke on Prison Island, and the only two sleeps he’d had since had brought him right back to the worst times of his life. After a dreamless sleep, he felt remarkably well-rested.

(Finally, Maria sighed with relief.)

He wondered if it was Sonic’s presence that brought him such peace. His soul was settled in a way it had not been in a long time. 

There was a creaking somewhere below them.

“Sonic?” Maddie called. 

Sonic sighed, breath ruffling Shadow’s fur, before he pulled away and sat up, turning to face the open window. “Up here!”

“Did you fall asleep on the roof again?”

(Caught red-handed, Blue said, then paused. Red-gloved?)

A beat. “No?”

Maddie’s chuckle rang out into the air. “All right. Well, come get cleaned up. Breakfast’s almost ready.” There was more creaking, and then her voice again, a bit farther away. “Bring Shadow, too!”

Sonic sputtered. “Mom—!” He was cut off by the trap door closing. 

“Should we go?” Shadow asked when a few seconds passed and the other didn’t say anything.

“Oh!” Sonic laughed, high and a bit manic. “Right! Yes, we should definitely go. Yes. Are you hungry? I’m hungry. Starving. Maybe she made chili dogs! We’ll never know if we don’t go see! So let’s just do that! C’mon!” In a flash, he was down the ladder and in the attic, leaving Shadow alone on the roof. He sat there for a moment, allowing himself to stew in his confusion, before he went to follow.

They weren’t eating at the dining table. Instead, Shadow found Sonic sitting on a stool in the kitchen, pulled up to the island in the middle. Knuckles was already there as well, sitting at one end of the counter. Shadow took the seat on the other end, next to Sonic who patted the stool enthusiastically. The air was filled with a few strange scents, one like oil and another that was deep and rich.

(Like that stuff Grandfather used to drink, Maria said. The stuff he’d never let us try! Oh, what was it called…)

Shadow couldn’t remember, so Maria’s voice likely wouldn’t either. Eventually, her musings fell silent.

“Sonic,” Maddie was saying from her place near the sink, “When I say no running, I mean no running. No powers.”

“I know, I know.” Sonic waved her off. “It was just, like, some stairs. No big deal.”

Tom, stationed at the stove, snorted. “He says as if he didn’t fall the moment he slowed down.”

Shadow raised an eyebrow. “You fell?”

“What?” Sonic asked in that same hysterical tone as his laugh on the roof. “No! I didn’t fall! I was… inspecting the floor. For damages. Nails. We need to get a wall repaired every other month, and you can never be too careful!”

(Good save, Blue said.)

Shadow didn’t particularly believe him. 

(Hey!)

It appeared that neither did Tom and Maddie, the two exchanging a knowing glance that he couldn’t begin to decipher.

Tails staggered into the room. The little alien was normally rather sharp, but that did not seem to be the case at the moment. He bumped into a wall, and then a counter, and only made it into his seat thanks to his eldest brother steering him there.

“Don’t worry about him,” Sonic said, clearly having noticed Shadow watching the proceedings. “He’s not really a morning person.” He lowered his voice. “Personally, I think it’s a little exaggerated to try and get Mom and Dad to let him have coffee. Not that I can think of why he’d want to.”

Tails, in the seat to Sonic’s left, glared at his brother, despite the fact that his head rested on the countertop. Tom reached over from the other side and scratched just behind Tails’s ear, making the glare fade in favor of a content smile.

“Right. Maddie, you don’t mind—”

“Ah, yep, got it.” She swerved in and took the pan her husband was watching from the stovetop, a two-handed job that he couldn’t quite manage with the cast, it seemed. A few moments later, plates were being deposited in front of each of them. There were strips of meat as well as some sort of bread that formed a grid. Two bowls of fruit made their way to the counter as well, and Shadow perked up, though he wasn’t quite sure if they were permitted to indulge yet.

Sonic didn’t care. He reached over, plucked a few  plump, uncut strawberries from the bowl before them, and deposited them onto an empty spot on Shadow’s plate without a word.

(Thank goodness, something to eat, Maria said. Consistently.)

(And it’s not nutrients pumped into your veins! Blue exclaimed. Even better!)

Maddie’s voice drew his attention, even if it wasn’t directed at him. “You want anything on your—”

Her son grinned, cutting her off. “Do you even have to ask? ”

Tom chuckled and passed over a bottle of some kind. “Okay, just take it easy, bud.”

As Sonic drenched his grid-bread in some kind of syrup, Maddie turned to Shadow instead. “What about you, kiddo? Anything you want on your waffle?”

He had no idea what any of the things in front of him were, nor what he was meant to put on them. “I don’t…” He bit down on the inside of his cheek and fell silent.

Sonic picked up on his frustration almost instantly. Setting the bottle of syrup down, he pointed to the strips. “That’s bacon,” he said. “It’s a type of meat. It’s great, you’ll love it.” His finger moved to the grid-bread. “That’s a waffle. It’s like a pancake but shaped different.” He seemed to realize quickly that Shadow also didn’t know what a ‘pancake’ was. “Uh, they’re like a cake-y type of bread. They’re pretty plain on their own, so people put toppings on them. Knuckles puts grapes—”

“The superior choice!” The red alien declared, his waffle covered in small fruit wedges that must be ‘grapes’.

“-Tails tries something new every time—”

“I’m cataloguing,” Tails said, more awake now that food was in front of him. “One day, I’ll have gone through all of the combinations and will know which one is ideal.”

“-And I like good old-fashioned syrup. A classic. Though I’m never impartial to some whip and chips every so often,” Sonic finished.

(Whip and chips? Maria repeated, just as confused as he was.)

“So, what should I use?” Shadow asked.

“That’s for you to decide,” Sonic said, as if it was easy or simple or something that he’d been able to do all his life. “Butter, syrup, whipped cream, chocolate chips, fruit, whatever you want! Heck, you can put-” His eyes quickly scanned the room- “Coffee beans if you want! It’s your choice.”

Shadow scrunched his nose. “Coffee beans?”

“You grind ‘em up to make coffee,” Tom explained across the counter. “They’re great.”

“They’re gross,” Sonic insisted. “Even if they smell good.”

Maddie hummed and reached into a bag tucked away near her. She placed a few small beans next to Shadow’s plate, and he drew one into his fingers. He eyed it skeptically.

“Dude, trust me, they suck,” Sonic said, sticking out his tongue.

“And we’re glad you think so.” Maddie tapped him lightly on the nose. “The last thing we need is you caffeinated.”

(That was what Grandfather always said! Maria laughed. At least about me. He probably just didn’t want to deal with any problems arising from you.)

Shadow squeezed the bean experimentally, but it didn’t give. It had the same deep, rich smell that he had caught when he’d first entered the kitchen. After a moment, he popped it into his mouth.

It was unlike anything he’d ever tasted, a strange combination of nutty, bold, and bitter as he bit down. His eyes widened, and he reached for another.

“Oh no,” Sonic moaned. “Don’t tell me you like it.”

Shadow finished the rest of the small handful and said, “Could I have a few for my—my waffle?”

Maddie smiled widely at him. “Of course.”

Sonic watched with thinly-veiled disgust as Maddie spread a bit of butter over Shadow’s waffle before sprinkling coffee beans into the crevices. 

Despite the looks that the blue— the other hedgehog kept shooting him, Shadow carefully cut into the waffle and ate it.

“You can’t seriously be enjoying that,” Sonic muttered, probably half-to-himself.

Shadow responded anyway. “You’re drowning yours in sugar. You’ve little room to talk.”

They finished breakfast, Tails at some point finally becoming conscious enough to protest the fact that Shadow was allowed to have coffee beans when he couldn’t. At some point, the doorbell rang, and Maddie abandoned her husband to deal with their youngest son’s complaints in favor of answering it.

Shadow wasn’t trying to listen in, but the house wasn’t very big, and his ears were rather good, so he heard perfectly as the door opened and Maddie said, “Hello. Can I help you?”

“Hello, ma’am,” a strikingly familiar voice replied. “That’s what I would like to know.”

(Wait, Blue said. Is that–)

(I think it might be, Maria murmured.)

Shadow was frozen in place for a single beat before he shot up out of his seat and to the front door.

(Rouge! Maria and Blue cheered.)

“Rouge?” He asked, hating the way his voice shook on the name.

She was in her human disguise, but it was her, undeniably her. She blinked before smiling at him with those teeth that gleamed unnaturally and those eyes that always knew more than she told. Her hand came forward to ruffle the fur between his ears. “Hey, hun,” she said. “Glad to see you’re all right.”

“What are you doing here?” He asked. 

“Well, after I couldn’t get a hold of you, I figured I’d rather know whether or not you were still alive,” she said. Her eyes found his wrist. “And the cuff is off? Even better.”

“Shadow,” Maddie said, drawing his attention back to her. He hunched his shoulders on instinct, but her expression was warm as she asked, “Is this a friend of yours?”

(Yes, Maria said.)

“A friend?” Shadow glanced back at Rouge. He’d not known her very long. Then again, he supposed he hadn’t known Sonic very long either, and whatever they shared went far deeper than friendship. He nodded hesitantly. “Yes. She is.”

“Great.” Maddie straightened. “Well, any friend of Shadow’s is welcome here, as long as they don’t have any plans of world-domination, but I don’t think he keeps that kind of company anymore.” She held out a hand. “Maddie Wachowski.”

Rouge shook her hand easily. “Rouge. It’s lovely to meet you.” Her voice was smooth, as it always was, and Shadow could see how she was so confident in her ability to get what she wanted.

“Well, come on in,” Maddie said, gesturing inside. “Let me get you something to drink. We were just finishing up breakfast.”

She walked back toward the kitchen, but Shadow lagged behind, and Rouge stayed with him.

“You all right, hun?” She asked in a low tone. “Like, actually?”

He swallowed and nodded. “I am. All right, I mean. Better than.”

(Aw, I’m flattered, Blue said, instantly knowing the context. Blushing, even.)

Rouge raised an eyebrow. “Better than, you say? Any reason in particular?”

His mouth was dry. His throat hurt. His soul sang. “It’s—It’s Blue,” he said. “He’s alive.”

She furrowed her brow, as if she couldn’t quite believe what she was hearing. To be fair, Shadow could still barely believe it. “What? ‘Blue’s alive?’ You mean your Blue? The one you—”

“Yes!” Shadow cut her off before she could say whatever embarrassing thing she could possibly be thinking of. “Yes. That Blue. He’s here. He’s alive.” A pause. “He thought I was dead.”

Rouge snorted. “Of course he did. Well, come on then. I want to meet him.”

He led her back to the kitchen, where the Wachowskis waited.

Sonic gasped, eyes shining. Chaos Energy sparked on his quills but was quickly quelled by his mother’s glare. “Sorry,” he said, before sliding off of the chair and coming over at a normal speed. He leaned against the counter for support, but there was little pain on his face. “Shadow!” He exclaimed. “You never told me you had a friend!”

“I met her a week ago,” Shadow said. “And I only found out you weren’t dead yesterday. Other things seemed more relevant.”

(Like falling asleep under the stars, Maria teased.)

“You wound me, hun.” Rouge used the same tone of voice Maria just had, and it made his throat hurt. She peered at Sonic. “So, you’re Shadow’s Blue, are you?”

His face felt as if it was on fire, even though there was no more cuff to set his blood ablaze. 

Sonic simply laughed. “Sonic Wachowski, at your service! Uh, later. Not now. Mom and Dad said I can’t be of service for at least three weeks, which is lame.”

“You’re healing, bud,” Tom said. “You’re lucky you’re not grounded for another four months.”

“Hey, I saved the world!” Sonic argued.

“Exactly,” Tom nodded. “Which is why you're not grounded. There’s nothing in the deal if you choose to do anything stupid before you’re cleared, though.”

(What? Blue sounded indignant. Stupid is what I do!)

Sonic grumbled and turned to Shadow. “Can you believe them?”

(No! Blue exclaimed.)

(Yes, Maria said.)

Shadow could. “You fell from space,” he said. “After holding off a planet-destroying laser. It’s likely in your best interest to not do anything… strenuous.”

Rouge raised a hand, calling focus back to herself. “Yes, hello, hi, quick question: what is all of this about falling from space and a planet-destroying laser?”

“Did you, like, miss it?” Sonic asked. “I’m pretty sure that was probably big news.”

“Oh, no, it certainly was,” Rouge said. “Two scientists bring a giant death ray into the atmosphere and charge it up to shoot the Earth into smithereens only for the younger one to abruptly have some sort of change-of-heart, profess his undying love for some agent—”

“Did he really?” Sonic screeched.

“-and save the world instead. I was halfway to portaling away, treasures be damned, when that Cannon exploded. What in Gaia’s name could you all have had to do with it?”

“I helped,” Shadow said. Rouge’s gaze flicked to him. It was piercing. “I helped steal the keys. I helped launch the Cannon. It was charged with my Chaos Energy. That’s why B— Why Sonic and I fought at first. He was trying to save the world. I was trying to destroy it.”

“Yeah, key bit there,” Sonic said sharply. “‘At first.’ We’ve talked about this, dude. You were confused. You were hurting. You’re not a bad person. Yeah, you did bad things, but you tried to make up for them. You’re still trying to make up for them. A bad person doesn’t use their own body to stop a laser from blowing up the Earth. A bad person doesn’t trek across the country just to apologize for something that wasn’t even their fault.” He moved away from the counter and grabbed Shadow’s hand, squeezing it tightly. “Trust me. I’m not friends with bad people.”

His chest was warm. His eyes stung. He tightened his grip on Sonic’s hand. “Okay.”

Rouge didn’t look as though she was quite certain what to focus on. Instead, she glanced up to Tom and Maddie. “Are they always like this?”

(No! Blue seemed to be saying that a lot.)

(They most certainly are, Maria chirped.)

“Well, we don’t have a particularly large sample size,” Maddie mused, “But yes.”

“Okay, okay, okay, thank you for that,” Sonic said, words a bit rushed. “Uh, why don’t we all go sit down somewhere else and we can do real introductions.”

“Oh, I would love to,” Rouge grinned. She flashed Shadow a wink that he didn’t quite understand, and only seemed more entertained at his confusion

They settled in the living room. Shadow sat on one end of the larger couch, Tails on the other, with Sonic in the middle. Tom and Maddie were on the other, smaller couch, with Knuckles perched on the armrest. Rouge lounged in a cushy chair as if she had lived there all her life.

“Well, may as well rip off the band-aid,” she said once everyone was seated. She reached up and fiddled with the jewel of her choker. There was a flash of light, and her true form sat in place of her human one. She stretched out her wings. “Oh, that feels good. Staying disguised for too long can make you really sore, you know?”

Sonic let out a shocked laugh. “You’re a Mobian?”

“You know it, hun,” she replied. “Rouge the Bat, lovely to meet you.”

“The thief?” Tails asked, dumbfounded.

“The one and only,” Rouge said. “Best in the universe.”

(Oh, she really is famous, Blue laughed.)

“Is that a Chameleon Quartz, then?” Tails’s eyes were wide. He hopped over and held out a hand. “Sorry. I’m Miles Wachowski. Call me Tails. Is it really?”

“One of only a dozen,” Rouge confirmed. “And unfortunately not for sale.”

“Oh, no, I don’t wanna buy it from you,” Tails laughed. “I don’t think we’ve got that kinda money. It’s just… I based some of my own technology around the idea of it! I never thought I’d get to see one in person!”

“You’re an inventor, then?” Rouge smiled, mischief dancing in her eyes. 

“Yeah!” Tails dug through a pouch he had looped around his body and held out a small pin. He skipped over to Maddie, who easily provided her collar for him to stick it to. “See, look!” He pressed the pin, and Maddie’s appearance changed, abruptly shifting from her face to that of a completely different woman. Then, it was a man, and then the family’s dog. Another press, and she changed back.

“ Gaia , kid, that’s incredible,” Rouge breathed. The mischief had shifted to something different. Excitement, Shadow thought. “I’ve traveled to more planets than I can count, and not one have I seen with tech capable of changing species as well as appearance.”

“Yeah, well…” Tails wrung his hands together, looking a bit flushed from the praise. “It only really works on humans right now. They don’t have as much latent Chaos Energy as even the average Mobian does. It makes them much easier to work with.”

“Not sure whether to take that as a compliment or an insult,” Tom muttered to his wife.

(I’d say it’s both, Maria decided.)

“Still,” Rouge said. “It’s impressive.”

Tails smiled bashfully, pulling at a tuft of fur. “Thank you.”

Rouge turned to Knuckles next, and a grin slowly grew on her face. “Oh, now this one I know. Knuckles the Echidna, am I right?”

“Last member of the Echidna Tribe,” Knuckles nodded sternly. “And valued member of the Wachowski Tribe. I have heard tales of you as well, Bat. Your lust for secrets is only less infamous than your lust for treasure.”

(He’s so dramatic, Blue snorted.)

“Jewels, in particular, but I suppose I won’t complain,” Rouge said. 

Knuckles slid off of the armrest, taking a step toward her, and she did the same. 

“You think they’re gonna fight?” Sonic whispered.

Shadow didn’t really have any idea. Tails replied, “Maybe. Or kiss.”

Sonic shoved Tails in the shoulder. “Dude, shut up.”

“Ten bucks says he likes her,” Tails said.

“Oh, how good it feels knowing I’m finally going to win a bet against you,” Sonic murmured.

Rouge held out her hand to shake. Tom and Maddie instantly looked tense, and Sonic and Tails leaned forward eagerly.

Knuckles took the outstretched hand and shook it. For a moment, Rouge’s eye twitched, and then her smile widened and her grip shifted as she seemed to tighten it. The sharp sound of cracking broke through the air, and neither of them reacted.

Then, when he pulled away, Knuckles quietly said, “I believe you have broken my hand.”

“My mistake,” Rouge replied. “Though I only give what I am given.”

She drifted back to her seat, and Knuckles looked as if he had stars in his eyes.

(Oh, he really likes her, Maria laughed.)

Sonic groaned as Maddie dragged Knuckles off to get his hand looked at. “Damn it.”

Tails snickered and patted his knee. “Maybe next time.”

The day went on, and it was nice. Rouge got along easily with the Wachowskis, her additions to any conversation being sharp and clever, though there was a bit of a stumble when they got to the topic of age.

It was during a conversation about rings.

“Yeah, we’re running low,” Sonic said, kicking his feet. They sat outside on the deck as the sun shined and clouds floated by lazily overhead. “Tails and Knuckles brought some with them, but even those can’t last forever.”

“I’m not old enough to buy them,” Tails grumbled, crossing his arms. “You’ve gotta be of age. Not that we have any money for a Mobian civilization anyway.”

Knuckles nodded. “I stole mine off of smugglers.”

“What is even considered of age for these other planets?” Tom asked.

“It differs by planet,” Rouge replied. “On Mobius, it’s forty years.”

(Forty? Blue cried.)

“Forty?”

“The equivalent to twenty Earth years,” Tails clarified. “Despite the difference in species, Mobians develop at about the same rate as humans do. So, as long as you know the conversion, the age on any other planet can be translated to what it would be on Earth relatively easily.”

Rouge hummed. “I used the rings my parents left behind for a long while. Once I turned three-hundred-and-fifty in Fest years, though, I was able to buy as many as I wanted. Which I did. With money I most certainly earned legitimately.”

“That age’s just barely under sixteen on Earth,” Tails said after checking something on his device.

Maddie blinked, as if something had just occurred to her. To be fair, Shadow believed he might be having the same thought. “Wait. Rouge, how… How old are you now?”

(Finally someone asks! Blue exclaimed.)

“In the same years?” Rouge asked. “Three-hundred-and-seventy-five. Wasn’t very long ago.”

“That’s, uh, a little over seventeen,” Tails said.

Maddie buried her face in her hands. “Oh, my god, you’re all babies.”

“Actually, according to my license, I’m twenty-three,” Rouge said, patting her purse.

“Tom,” Maddie said, completely ignoring the bat, “Tom, we’re gonna run out of rooms.”

They ended up back inside a few hours later, somehow playing the same musical from before. Tails was still singing along. 

“Why are we watching this again?” Shadow asked Sonic when he was sure the little alien wasn’t listening.

“He’s been obsessed ever since it came out,” Sonic said. He seemed exhausted, curled up against Shadow on the couch. Rouge had thrown a blanket over both of them before settling on the other couch across from Knuckles. Though she appeared to be teasing him relentlessly, there was a fondness in her eyes and a flush beneath the fur of her cheeks. 

The bowl of rings the Wachowskis kept at the front of the house was full once more, due to the impromptu trip to another planet that Rouge had taken to buy some. She’d insisted that it was just further payment to Shadow for helping her steal the Diamond in exchange for a car ride. Knuckles had offered her an official thanks anyway, and Shadow wondered how she could be so easily charmed by such a thing.

(You’re one to talk, Maria giggled.)

Shadow glanced down at Sonic’s head against his shoulder and stayed quiet.

“Are you not a fan?” Sonic asked, drawing him back into their talk.

“It’s fine,” Shadow said. “Good, I suppose. He just seems to be… quite the fan.”

“Elphaba’s an outcast,” Sonic murmured, gesturing to the green woman on screen that Tails was emulating. “Pushed away and hated, even by her own family, for something about herself that she can’t control, for—for being born different. He knows how that feels. There’s… Tails’s birth parents are still alive, from what he knows, and if he never sees them again, it won’t be long enough.”

(Oh, Maria murmured, and said nothing more.)

Shadow understood what Sonic meant, though it was difficult to see. Tails smiled widely and laughed brightly and thought more sharply than just about anyone Shadow had ever met, and considering the company that he kept in the facility, that was saying something. As the movie continued to play, he forced himself to listen more closely to the lyrics, watching the way Tails swayed with the music as if he could feel every word in his soul.

After the final song, he asked, “What is ‘to be continued’ meant to mean?”

“It’s the end of Act One,” Tails replied. “In the stage production, it’s intermission. For the movie, they decided to end it there, and the second movie will be Act Two.”

Shadow furrowed his brow. “What is an ‘act?’”

It was a mistake to ask such a question.

He was trapped for over an hour as Tails explained the concept of Broadway to him. Rouge disappeared into the backyard with Knuckles at some point, the red alien insistent on sharing fighting techniques, and none of Shadow’s pleading glances convinced her to remain behind. 

As Tails rambled, Sonic fell asleep against his arm, and Shadow tried to allow himself to enjoy the conversation. It was rather one-sided, but the fox seemed so excited. Shadow was almost reminded of Maria, when she came up with a new skating trick she wanted to try, or when a new shipment of movies came in, or when a prank went even better than she’d hoped.

(Oh, the fun we had, she said wistfully, and he couldn’t help but agree.)

That night, then, when everyone headed to bed and Rouge was assigned the guest room directly next to his, Shadow snuck out before the creaking in the attic had even faded and knocked lightly on her door.

“Hey, hun,” she said softly, cracking the door open and letting him inside. “You need something?”

“Money,” he replied. “Preferably a good amount.”

A smirk tugged at her lips. “I’m afraid I’m a bit low on cash at the moment,” she said, “But I’ve an idea where we can get more, if you’re up for it.”

He was sure he knew what she was getting at. “No trackers this time.”

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

(I’d be worried if she was, Blue said.)

The heist was easy. It was uneventful. It was great. Rouge grabbed some jewels that she wanted, as well as a few other things. “These are what we’ll sell,” she explained. “The rest are just… for fun.”

Things were made simpler with her plan accounting for his teleportation. They were in and out in less than an hour, and Shadow appreciated it, because he was tired, and he had a feeling that neither he nor Sonic would be able to sleep until they were sure the other was still breathing.

“That was fun,” Rouge said, placing her new treasures on the desk. “Who knew how easy grabbing something from the Smithsonian could be when you’ve got a guy who can teleport on your side? Though I’m sad we couldn’t grab the big one.”

“‘The big one?’” Shadow echoed.

“The Hope Diamond,” Rouge sighed dreamily. “Ah, well. There’s always next time. Anyway, I’ll have money for you to burn tomorrow morning.”

He had no idea how she was going to do that. “You scare me, sometimes,” he said rather than asking.

She grinned, and her teeth gleamed. “Good.”

When he exited Rouge’s room, the trapdoor was already open. He climbed up and found Sonic sitting up in his bed, staring at him.

“You weren’t there when I checked,” he said, voice a bit scratchy. Shadow wasn’t sure if it was a blessing or a curse that the room was so dark. “I didn’t…”

“I had to do something,” Shadow said. Sonic patted the spot next to him, and he moved quickly, settling in on the other hedgehog’s left. “Sorry.”

“No, don’t be sorry.” Sonic sniffed. “It’s stupid. All of this is stupid.” He was quiet for a moment and then asked, “What were you doing?”

(Having a bonding moment, Blue said.)

“Rouge and I went to steal something.”

(I guess that works, too.)

Sonic let out a bark of laughter. “What? Really? Why?”

“I needed money.”

“For what?”

Shadow’s face heated. “A surprise,” he said.

“Okay, keep your secrets,” Sonic joked. “I’ll get them out of you, one way or another. So , what’d you steal?”

“More jewels,” Shadow shrugged. “But I think those are just for her. She’s planning on selling some other artifacts she snatched while we were there.”

Sonic leaned into his side. “While you were where? Where’d you go?”

Shadow scrunched his nose, trying to recall what Rouge had called. “The Smith-something.”

“Oh, my god, you guys stole from the Smithsonian?” Sonic wheezed. “Did you snatch the Hope Diamond while you were there?”

Shadow was a bit surprised Sonic knew what that was. “No,” he said, “But Rouge wants to get that next time.”

“Yeah, sure, with a million times more security,” Sonic chuckled.

“Makes it more fun.”

“You’re ridiculous,” Sonic said.

They fell into a companionable silence. Sonic played with the fur on Shadow’s arm, and Shadow let his head rest against the top of Sonic’s. It wasn’t uncomfortable, because Shadow didn’t think that he could really be uncomfortable with Sonic. Not anymore. Their hearts had beaten in tandem and their souls had sung in harmony, and something had fundamentally changed with such a melody.

(What did I say? Blue asked. ‘Friends seems too light a word?’ Something wise like that.)

Shadow scrunched his nose. It was strange having Blue chattering away in his head when Sonic was next to him, calm and quiet. He wondered if one day he would say something only to find that the voice he was responding to was the one that only dwelled within his own mind. He wondered if Sonic would think he was crazy.

(Of course I wouldn’t, Blue scoffed, as if the very idea was madness.)

Shadow hoped not.

Sonic poked him lightly. “Hey,” he said softly, “What’re you thinking about?”

“Nothing important,” Shadow replied.

“Don’t give me that,” Sonic huffed. “I’d like to think we’re past that kinda stuff.”

They barely knew one another. They’d known each other all their lives. The very cores of their beings had been laid bare, with only the stars and their eyes as witnesses. They had never had ‘that kinda stuff.’ Somehow, they were well past it regardless.

“I hear voices,” Shadow admitted.

Sonic hummed and said nothing, and after a long moment he managed to continue.

“Ever since I fell,” he said. “Maria was… I heard her sometimes, but that was— They were memories. This is different. They’re always there, commenting on the person I’m talking to or the book that I’m reading.”

“Is it just Maria?” Sonic asked, though it sounded as if he already knew the answer. “Or is there someone else? Someone elses? Like, I don’t know…”

Sonic was certainly thinking about the Professor. Shadow wasn’t sure he would be able to handle the Professor that often, though, even one conjured up by his own mind. He thought that might be worse, actually.

“It was you,” Shadow said, and Sonic’s jaw snapped closed. “You and Maria. I kept hearing them. I still hear them. No matter what I do, they don’t go away. Sometimes I—I think that… I think this all might be like that again. None of this is real, and it’s just some—some messed up way for my mind to—to try and forget.”

“I don’t know about all that,” Sonic said after a long moment, “But I’m real. I swear. You can feel it, can’t you?”

He could. That was the worst part, Shadow thought. He could feel within his soul that Sonic was alive, was breathing right next to him, and yet he still couldn’t help the anxiety that maybe, just maybe, this was all some elaborate trick. Maybe he would wake up, still falling through space.

Maybe he would wake up dead.

(Stop thinking like that, Maria scolded.)

He pulled at his ears, but it didn’t do anything to drown out her voice, because nothing did.

“I just want to stop hearing them,” Shadow murmured. An arm winded around his back, and Sonic shifted them so that Shadow was leaning against him instead. “They’re always there, and I know they aren’t real, but they sound real. I don’t…I don’t like hearing her. Not when she’s gone.”

A hand came up and rubbed steady circles into his shoulder. “I’m sorry,” Sonic said. “That you’re dealing with that. It sounds like it sucks.”

Shadow let out a breathy sound, something between a laugh, a whine, and a sob. “It does.”

“Well, for what it’s worth, I’m glad you told me.” Sonic pulled him closer, as if he could force out the voices if he only tried hard enough. “I spent a good few years still seeing Longclaw. I would hear her voice, or see her face, or feel her feathers against my neck, and I’d think that she’d survived, and finally come back to bring me home.” He let out a shaky breath. “It was around when I came to Earth that I finally started to accept the truth. That was, like, three years after she died, though. Earth years, I mean. It would’ve been a lot easier if I wasn’t alone…” 

It was hard to think about. Sonic thrived with his family, thrived around other people . Shadow struggled to imagine a Sonic that had no one. It didn’t feel possible. It didn’t feel fair.

Sonic pulled away for a moment so that their eyes could meet, red and green glowing faintly in the dark. “And that’s what great, Shadow. You are not alone. You have me, and Mom and Dad, and Tails, and Knuckles, and Rouge. We all care about you, and we’re all here for you.”

Shadow almost asked why. He remembered their conversation on the roof the night before, though, and bit down on his tongue. Sonic forgave him, even if he shouldn’t have. People who care about each other are there for one another. If nothing else, Maria had taught him that .

“I don’t want to hear them anymore,” Shadow finally said. “I want them to stop. How do I get them to stop?”

Sonic clicked his tongue. “Well, the bad news is, you can’t. At least not by, like, snapping your fingers or something. I don’t know too much about this stuff, but I’m sure about that. The good news, though, is that you can work on it. We can work on it. We’ll talk to Mom and Dad tomorrow morning, and figure out a way through this. They’ve been trying to find a way to get me, Tails, and Knux into therapy. I’m sure they’d be happy to add you into the mix.”

Shadow knew a few things about therapy from the facility, but he was quite sure that the therapy that the scientists put him through was nothing like whatever the Wachowskis were working on getting for their sons. He hoped they would explain. He didn’t want to think about doing anything like what he did whenever he went into the lab at the base.

“That’ll help?” He asked. He hated how small his voice sounded.

Sonic didn’t seem to care. “I don’t know,” he said simply. “But I hope so.”

Somehow, that was enough for him. “Okay,” Shadow breathed. “I hope so, too.”

“So…” Sonic dragged out the word. “Can you really not tell me what you need so much money for that you stole from the Smithsonian?”

“I don’t know how much money I need,” Shadow said. “But I was sure it would be a lot. I’ll let Rouge handle it.”

“But what is it?” Sonic pressed.

Shadow scowled. “It is meant to be a surprise.”

“I won’t tell anyone!” Sonic exclaimed. “Cross my heart, hope to die.”

“Don’t hope for that,” Shadow said. “And should I tell you, you must swear yourself to secrecy. Rouge says that surprises are no fun if someone ruins them.”

“I swear, I won’t tell a soul,” Sonic insisted. “Cross my heart, hope to— uh, cry, I guess.”

Shadow supposed he was satisfied. “I’m going to buy Tails tickets for Wicked.”

A beat. “What?!”

Chapter Text

His therapist’s name was Audrey.

She was from a larger city called Columbia Falls, some forty minutes away from Green Hills. Originally, the drive was made twice a week. On Mondays, when Maddie worked late, Knuckles and Tails would climb into the family truck with Tom and head for their appointments. On Thursdays, when it was the reverse, Sonic, Shadow, and Rouge would go with Maddie for theirs.

Shadow wasn’t quite sure how it was that Audrey found out about the fact that he was an alien. He supposed that the other four, with completely different therapists from him, had the same roadblock, but it still didn’t answer his question.

The appointments were scattered a bit, so Rouge went in for hers, followed by Sonic a half-hour later, and Shadow fifteen minutes after that. Maddie had offered her hand, but when he didn’t take it she simply placed it on his shoulder instead.

He could see a flicker of surprise in the therapist’s eyes when she called his name and Maddie guided him over. Still, she smiled at him and said, “Hello. Shadow?”

His throat was clogged. His head hurt. He wished that Sonic was there. “Yes,” Maddie said for him. “Sorry, he’s… not very used to this kind of thing.”

“That’s all right,” the other woman said. Her gaze moved back to him. “It’s great to meet you, Shadow. I’m Audrey. Would you like to come sit down?”

He did not want to. He followed her anyway, leaving Maddie behind in the waiting room.

Audrey’s room was comfortable, at least. They were on the third floor of an older brick building, and through the blinds on the window he could see the streets of Columbia Falls, so much larger than Green Hills was.

(I wonder how many people live here, Maria whispered excitedly.)

“You can take a seat wherever you’re comfortable,” Audrey said. There weren’t very many options. He pressed himself into one corner of the couch, and she sat in the armchair across from him.

“How are you today, Shadow?” She asked after they were both settled.

(Tell the truth, Maria said.)

“Fine,” he replied. It was true enough. He hadn’t had a nightmare the previous night. He and Sonic had fallen asleep in the living room while watching through the John Wick movies at the latter’s insistence, and Tom and Maddie had decided to just leave them there. He’d woken up warm and safe, with another heartbeat in his ears as he’d lied half-sprawled over the other hedgehog. Any nightmares he could have had were dispelled by the soul that sang in harmony with his, only a moment away.

(I’m still here, Blue said. I’m right here.)

Audrey hummed. “Why don’t you tell me what you’re here for?”

He scrunched his nose. “Don’t you already know that?”

“I know some things,” she said. “But I want to hear it from you.”

She didn’t get much out of him in the first session, but her presence was oddly grounding. When he walked out, giving her a small wave goodbye, Sonic was sitting there waiting for him.

“Maddie and Rouge are already in the car,” he said. “They went and got cookies. You have fun?”

“No,” Shadow replied.

Sonic laughed, and led him out of the building.

The week after their first therapy appointments, and nearly a month into Shadow and Rouge’s stay with the Wachowskis, the school year began. Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles all went. Rouge even ended up attending, part of a deal with Maddie to allow her to continue stealing things. Shadow knew that she could keep stealing on her own, deal or not, but he thought she might actually appreciate feeling as if there was someone watching out for her, even if she would never admit it.

He was the only one who couldn’t really go. G.U.N. apparently kept a careful eye on the records of the Wachowski kids, and Shadow didn’t have a way to disguise himself like Rouge could. Tails’s pins still didn’t work great on beings with a higher amount of Chaos Energy, and even then Shadow was on a whole different level. 

Instead, Tails and Rouge worked together to create an identity for him that he could use for online school. It wasn’t the same, but Maddie insisted that it was important he be learning. He was dropped off at the school with the rest of them, and spent his day on a computer in the library. It wasn’t really allowed, but exceptions were made for all of the Wachowskis, and even if he wasn’t a Wachowski, it seemed that being an alien was close enough.

Sonic visited him during his lunch period, hanging off of a chair next to Shadow and bothering him until he couldn’t focus and agreed to go and eat something.

“I don’t get how you’re able to get through that stuff,” Sonic said as he dragged Shadow off to the cafeteria. “If my school was all on the computer, I’d just spend all day playing video games.”

(A great choice! Blue declared. Why aren’t you doing that?)

“I have to get my tasks done,” Shadow replied. “So I do them.”

“Well, at least one of us can,” Sonic shrugged.

The two of them didn’t always fall asleep together, but they did always wake up that way. Many nights, Shadow would lie in bed as long as he could until the buzzing in his brain to go check overpowered any willpower he had. Sometimes, Sonic would beat him to it, pushing open his door and collapsing on top of him before Shadow even had a moment to react. Other times, one of them would have a nightmare and wake up to find the other waiting for them. Whatever the reason, they always ended up together.

It was after one such nightmare-filled night that Audrey asked, “How are you today, Shadow?” It was their seventh meeting. He had never responded to her in any way that mattered.

“I had a nightmare last night,” he said. 

She didn’t react to the proper reply. “Yeah? Would you like to tell me about it?”

He wouldn’t.

(You should, Maria murmured.)

(It’ll never get better otherwise, Blue confirmed. You don’t wanna spend the rest of our lives waking me up every time you can’t get through the night, do you?)

The thought made his stomach churn. 

He swallowed. “I was back in the— in the lab. The Professor called me in. He told me that—that they wouldn’t need my assistance anymore. They’d found a new way to make energy. I was—I was so excited. We went to the—to the track, though, and it was—” His breath hitched, and something like a whine came out.

“You can take a break if you want to,” Audrey said gently. “You don’t have to tell me anything else today.”

He didn’t respond to her. He balled his hand into a fist and wished he could feel his claws through the gloves. After a moment, he continued, “It was Sonic. He—He was the new energy source. The Professor, he—he said that we were going to watch the new era of humanity be born. He made Sonic run, and run, and run. He— It was hurting him, and I—I told him to stop, I begged him to stop, but he didn’t. I remember— Sonic was screaming, and I was screaming, and—and when I woke up, I was still screaming. I didn’t— I woke everyone up with it. I couldn’t remember how to breathe until Sonic got there and—and I felt that he was still alive.”

Audrey wrote as he talked, but she was looking at him with soft eyes as he finished, as if he was the only thing in the world. “That sounds hard,” she said. “Do you get nightmares like that often?”

(Yes, Maria pushed.)

He nodded.

She jotted something down.  “Is the Professor prominent in them?” 

He was. Shadow wondered if he would ever be able to forget the man’s face. He wondered if he even still remembered it, or if the visage in his mind was nothing more than an amalgamation of his worst fears, set behind a familiar pair of thin-wire glasses. He didn’t think it mattered. He nodded again.

“Could you tell me about him?”

They didn’t get through anything else in that session. Shadow was too lost in his memories, feeling spindly phantom fingers around his arms and soot on bushy moustache hairs. Audrey was able to talk him back to the present enough to lead him out of the room. Sonic was waiting for him, as he always was.

“You have fun?” Sonic asked, as he always did.

“No,” Shadow replied. “I talked to her, though.”

Sonic nudged him, pride emanating from him. “There you go! Good. You should do that more.”

(Any progress is better than no progress, Maria said.)

Back at the Wachowski house, Sonic took a deal of time longer to heal than was initially anticipated. As it turned out, not listening to the doctors’ recommendations and using his abilities did indeed have adverse effects. He was stuck not running for a good few weeks, and he acted as if he was dying every moment of it.

“Just put me out of my misery, Shads,” he groaned. “Maybe then I’ll be able to feel the grass under my feet again, the wind through my fur.”

Shadow sighed. They sat across from one another on the couch, legs entangled in the middle. He pulled away and set his own feet on the ground, ignoring Sonic’s grumbling as he did. “There isn’t much I can do about the first part,” he said, “But I might be able to help with the second.”

The only other person in the house was Rouge, trying on new lipstick colors up in her room. Tom and Maddie were out grocery shopping, and Knuckles and Tails were playing baseball with some of the other kids in town after a long talk about being careful to not use their full potential against very fragile human children. There was no one to ask for permission.

Shadow decided there was also no need. The moment that Sonic realized what he was doing, he eagerly agreed. It took a moment, but eventually he had Sonic secured on his back, legs hooked under his arms and body pressing against his quills. 

“Not too fast,” he said, half to himself. “I don’t think it’d be great to shock you while you’re up there.”

Sonic scoffed. “I could take it, old man.”

(Blue cackled.)

Shadow paused his walk toward the front door. “‘Old man?’”

“Dude, you’re from, like, the seventies. That’s old.”

“I was frozen!” Shadow shot back indignantly. “I’m the same age you are!” Tails had said so.

“Sure. So what would you prefer instead?” Sonic snickered as they stepped out onto the porch. “Pretty boy?”

(You are rather pretty, Maria giggled.)

Shadow thought his face might be on fire. He was glad that Sonic couldn’t see. “Shut up.”

(Hey, you should take the compliment! Blue said. I don’t give those out unless I mean ‘em!)

He channeled Chaos Energy into his shoes and sped off down the street, Sonic’s yelp cutting off any more of his incessant teasing.

They didn’t run for very long, only about forty minutes. Sonic didn’t talk for much of it, though, too lost in enjoying the air in his fur. Shadow allowed himself to appreciate it too. He looked around at the world, bursting with life, at the way the late-afternoon sunlight bounced off of the lake and brushed the mountaintops and lit up the sky. He could feel Sonic’s heart beating in tandem with his own, and Maria and Blue sat quietly in the back of his thoughts, giving him a bit of peace, if only for a bit.

When they got back, the car was still out of the driveway, but Rouge was sitting in the kitchen, a shopping bag on the counter.

“Hello, boys,” she said as they entered. Shadow carefully put Sonic down after closing the front door behind them.

“Hey, Rouge,” Sonic said, bounding over to her as much as he could. “Love the color. What’d you get?”

She grinned at him, sharp teeth gleaming past deep purple lips. “Thanks, hun. I grabbed some new gloves.”

“Ooh!” Sonic dug through the bag without asking, but Rouge didn’t seem upset. He pulled out new sets of gloves, and then furrowed his brow as he withdrew a box. “What’re these?”

“Fabric markers,” Rouge replied easily. “Someone said that you’re a bit of an artist.”

Shadow was quietly watching the proceedings, but Sonic’s eyes flew over to him in a heartbeat, wide and bright. His face was warm, especially as Sonic gave him a smile and made sunlight appear in the room with it.

Rouge winked at him as Sonic shoved everything back into the bag and hurried off into the living room, pulling Shadow along with him.

(What was that meant to mean? Blue asked, even though Shadow had no answer.)

It ended up being a wonderful distraction. Sonic was quite content to spend the day carefully designing pairs of gloves for all of them while random television programs played in the background.

“Shadow, you think this should be orange or green?” Sonic asked, as he often did when he couldn’t decide on a color or a pattern.

“Uh…” Shadow glanced away from the show about sewer-dwelling turtles with a rat for a father to look down at the glove. He flicked his eyes up to meet emerald. “Green.”

Sonic flashed him a smile. “Thanks, Shads.” 

He made pairs for everyone. Rouge’s was first, as a thank you, and had a black-and-purple lace-like design snaking down the white fabric. Knuckles’s was covered in ‘Pokemon,’ creatures from what were apparently his favorite games. Tails’s was Wicked-themed, given to him long before the surprise of the tickets, with one glove being for Glinda and the other for Elphaba. 

Even Tom and Maddie got pairs, one covered in donuts and the other in pretzels. It was some sort of inside joke, it seemed.

It was in Sonic’s room one night that Shadow was given his pair. He wasn’t sure when the gloves were made, since he had been there for all the rest, which had been time-consuming, to say the least. Still, in the dim light of an old lamp, as they both lay against one beanbag, Sonic handed him his pair, covered in newspaper.

Shadow carefully pulled away the wrapping, revealing his gloves. The base was a dark blue, with smatterings of little stars across. There were swirls of colors, like galaxies, and tiny planets dotting the base of each finger, and the image of the moon on the inside of the palms. One moon had a pair of golden and platinum figures, while the other had one of blue and black-and-red.

(Oh! Maria gasped. It’s you!)

(And me, Blue pointed out.)

His throat hurt. They were over the Earth, laser burning against their bodies, and then Sonic was slipping away from him and Shadow couldn’t even do him the courtesy of trying to save him. “I can’t accept these.”

“Sure you can,” Sonic said. “Everyone else did.”

“I’m not everyone else,” Shadow muttered.

A hand came over to rest on top of his own. “No,” Sonic said softly. “You’re not.” He said it as if it wasn’t a bad thing, and he was so earnest, so genuine, that it was easy to want to believe him.

(You should believe him, Maria murmured.)

Shadow tucked the gloves away in his room and didn’t wear them often, lest they get damaged. Still, any time he pulled them on, Sonic’s eyes would light up even more than usual, and it was that look, above anything else, that got him to keep doing it.

The days began to get colder, summer properly turning to fall as October wore on. Sonic was finally given the all-clear to run on his own to the fullest extent he could, and the first thing that he did was challenge Shadow to a race.

It was different, racing Sonic properly. Shadow didn’t think he’d be able to keep up without his air shoes, but they gave him the boost he needed to stay at Sonic’s pace. For his part, Sonic seemed beyond thrilled to have someone that could move as fast as him.

“I always race Tails and Knuckles,” Sonic said after their third race. So far, Shadow had won only the second, but the two times he’d lost had only been by tenths-of-a-second. He supposed that was a lot at their speed. “And I always beat them, but I also… I don’t know. I slow down for them, you know? I’m not even sure if they realize it.”

“Tails surely does,” Shadow said. They started the trek back toward the house, moving at a regular pace. 

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Sonic laughed. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s found a way to calculate my max speed.” A pause. “Did the scientists ever figure out yours?”

(They never answered me when I asked, Maria said.)

Shadow’s mouth was a bit dry, but he replied, “No. Or, if they did, they never told me. They didn’t tell me a lot of things.”

Sonic reached over and took his hand. “Well, I’ll do my best to make up for that.” It sounded like a joke, based around how often Sonic rambled and Shadow only listened, but it was clear that he meant it.

His tenth meeting with Audrey was a week before Halloween. For the previous two sessions, he had been rather tight-lipped about the things revealed in the seventh. He wasn’t sure what it was, but that changed.

“How are you today?” Audrey asked.

“Fine,” he said, like he always did.

“Good to hear,” she said. “Would you tell me more about this ‘Professor?’”

“He…He was the lead of the Project.”

“‘The Project?’” She echoed.

He nodded stiffly. “It was called the Chaos Initiative at first. Then, it was Project Shadow.”

There were likely a good number of things that he told her that it was illegal for her to know. He didn’t particularly care, though. She seemed smart enough to know what to stay quiet about.

(Hey, G.U.N. hasn’t shown up yet, Blue pointed out.)

“‘Project Shadow,’ huh?” She glanced down at her notes, and then back up at him. “What was that about?”

“It was meant to—to harness and use a source of Chaos Energy to bring humanity into—into a new age. It was—It was gonna be the future,” he explained.

“And where do you come into it?”

“I was it,” Shadow said. “The—The source of Chaos Energy. That was me.”

Her brow furrowed almost imperceptibly. “It was meant to use energy—Chaos Energy—that you produced in order to help humanity progress?”

Shadow nodded. “The Professor was the lead. He— I came down in an—an asteroid. At first, they didn’t— They thought that I wasn’t— They didn’t know that I could think.”

Her eyes widened just a bit. 

“They’d— They would make me run until I couldn’t feel my legs. They’d cut me open while I was awake to watch how my heart beat and—and how my lungs breathed. They’d stick me in a tube for days at a time, until I thought I might go crazy.” He paused and then lowered his voice. “I still might go crazy.”

Audrey spent the rest of the session talking through that time with him, and though he wasn’t sure what exactly was accomplished, he couldn’t help but feel a bit more settled in his own skin when he left.

“You have fun?” Sonic asked, getting up from his seat in the waiting room.

“No,” Shadow replied. “I told her about the Professor. About the time before—before Maria.”

Sonic was the only other being on Earth who knew about that time—truly knew about that time. There were records, of course, sitting in G.U.N.’s files and databases, but none of them came from him. None of them really knew what it was like. Shadow had told Sonic, in bits and pieces on rooftops and under blankets. Now, he had started to tell Audrey, too.

“That can’t have been easy,” Sonic said, squeezing his hand. “I’m proud of you. You should be proud of yourself, too.”

Shadow wasn’t. For once, though, he thought that maybe he’d get there.

The following week, at his eleventh meeting with Audrey, she greeted him a bit differently.

“Happy Halloween, Shadow,” she said. “How are you today?”

(Wonderful! Maria squealed. It’s Halloween!)

Instead of answering as he always did, Shadow said, “Halloween was Maria’s favorite holiday.”

He had never mentioned Maria to Audrey. She smiled softly, as if she understood the importance behind the name regardless. “Why don’t you tell me about her?”

When they got home from the appointments that afternoon, it was a rush to get everyone ready in time for trick-or-treating. Sonic went as John Wick, surprising absolutely no one. Rouge helped him get his look right, dressed in a Catwoman suit herself after Sonic had guilted everyone into reading the comics together while he was still injured. She said it was to be ironic, and no one mentioned it when Knuckles came from his room in the back shed dressed as Batman. 

Tails had managed to rope Shadow into being the Glinda to his Elphaba. Shadow thought he got the short end of the stick, stuck on the floor in the pink dress as Tails flew around with a broom strapped to his hand to make sure he didn’t drop it.

“Hey, Shads!” Sonic exclaimed, hopping over. He was in a dark suit, fake blood stuck to the sides of his head. “Lookin’ good!”

“I’m going to lose my mind,” Shadow replied, kicking his feet out. “I’m not wearing these shoes all night.”

Sonic made a face. “Yeah, heels suck. Here, I won’t tell if you don’t.”

While no one was looking, Sonic helped Shadow out of the heels and back into his air shoes. He skipped over to the kitchen island where the tiara sat and set it carefully on Shadow’s head, maneuvering the quills around it to hold it in place.

“Oh, look at you!” Maddie exclaimed, clapping her hands together. Tom had a camera in his hands, the cast finally gone, with a smile just as wide as his wife’s.

“Don’t worry about taking too many pictures, Dad,” Sonic said, posing regardless. “You’ll catch the same thing at prom in a few years.”

Shadow didn’t know what that meant. Tom raised an eyebrow, looking amused. “Is that right?” He asked teasingly.

Sonic tensed, eyes widening as if he’d said something he hadn’t meant to. “Uh, I just meant me! Not Shadow! Or, I mean, it could be Shadow, if he wants it to be, but not, like, the two of us! Or, I mean—”

“Okay, bud, don’t hurt yourself, I was just kidding,” Tom said.

“Oh.” Sonic’s shoulders lowered and he laughed nervously. “Right. Kidding. Okay. Right.”

(What just happened? Maria asked, as if he would know any better than her.)

There was a chance that they were too old for trick-or-treating, and as Shadow looked out at the many children about, he felt even more sure of it. Maria had always wanted to go with him, though, and he felt that he had to, at least once. For her.

With their heightened speeds, they were able to hit every house before the night was out. The couches and chairs in the sitting room were pushed back to make space for them all to pour their spoils out on the floor.

Shadow hadn’t tried many of the candies, and so made sure to keep at least one of each type. Tails and Rouge gave him tips on other ones while Sonic argued with Knuckles over whether or not it was fair that the latter get every one of the grape-flavored pieces.

At one point, Maddie came in as well and traded with Shadow, taking some of her and Tom’s favorites in exchange for little packages of chocolate-covered coffee beans. As he popped a few into his mouth, he couldn’t help but think it a worthy trade.

Thanksgiving arrived a few weeks later. It was a holiday that Shadow never really had fond memories of, though it wasn’t bad. He never did anything to celebrate, generally sleeping through it. The scientists would push him extra hard in the days leading up to it, and then would largely depart to see their families, only a comparative few remaining on staff throughout. The Professor was always there, as was Maria, but they spent the holiday with the rest of the humans in the main cafeteria.

(I always brought you a slice of pie, though, Maria said.)

That was true. She would convince the Professor to let her have some of the leftover pie and would store it in a small refrigerator in her room until the next time Shadow had free time, when they would eat the slices together. It made the extra pushing, the increased time in the tube, all right in the end.

In the Wachowski house, though, things were different. Shadow was a part of the celebrations. They all worked together throughout the day before and the day of Thanksgiving to make sure that everything was ready. Shadow helped Maddie with the mashed potatoes and the carrots, the two of them entertained watching as Sonic tried his best to convince Tom to make a pot of chili, to no avail.

When it was time for the meal, they took a pause before eating. 

“Now comes the best part of Thanksgiving,” Maddie said.

“The food?” Sonic asked, though he didn’t move to grab anything.

Tom rolled his eyes fondly. “Now, we all go around the table and say what we’re thankful for.”

(What aren’t we thankful for? Maria mused. After everything?)

There was quickly a common theme.

“I’m thankful for my brothers,” Tails said. “And for Mom and Dad, and for—for a place where people don’t hate me for the way I was born.”

“I am also most grateful for my brothers,” Knuckles declared. “And for the Wachowski Tribe! Even if our bonds are not forged in blood, they are forged in something even greater: mutual respect, trust, and love.”

“Well said, buddy,” Tom said, voice oddly choked. “I’m thankful for all of you, and for the choices that you all have made. It’s not always been easy, but I am so thankful that you’re all here with us now.”

“It’s the same for me,” Maddie nodded. “I’m thankful that you all feel safe here, and that we are able to give you a place that you can call home.”

“I suppose I’m thankful for somewhere… quiet and simple,” Rouge said softly. “So much of my life has been spent doing everything I can to prove people wrong when they don’t even care if I live or die. It is nice to be in a place where it… doesn’t feel that way.”

“I’m thankful for the Earth.” Beneath the table, Sonic’s hand squeezed his. “Without it, I never would have met all of you. I never would’ve found a home, and people that I loved. I’m thankful for Mom’s croissant recipes, and Dad’s fishing trips, and Tails’s impromptu musical theater performances, and Knuckles’s spars—even if he still needs to chill out on the punches—and Rouge’s late-night gossip sessions, and-” His grip tightened- “And I’m thankful that Shadow is here. With us.”

He was the last one who had to go. It felt as if there was an endless amount of pressure on him. Still, there was only one thing that he thought he could really say. “I’m thankful for second chances,” he murmured.

“Yeah,” Tom said after a long moment of silence. “I think we all are.” He picked up his glass, not mentioning how his eyes were rimmed with red. “All right, let’s do cheers. I’m hungry!”

The meal was wonderful. The company even more so. For once, Shadow didn’t let himself wonder what he had possibly done to deserve the sort of love he felt in the Wachowski house, and simply chose to eat his potatoes instead.

They were great.

Three days later, the Sunday after the holiday, was Tails’s birthday. After talking about aging on the other planets, he and Rouge had taken it upon themselves to figure out the birthdays for everyone. The only one who didn’t have one was Shadow, though Tails was trying to figure out a work-around. Either way, it was the perfect opportunity to give him the gift that he’d been holding onto since he and Rouge robbed the Smithsonian at the end of July.

There was a party in the park with some of the neighborhood kids, a party that Shadow opted out of. Instead, he waited until the family’s own small celebration at home, when everyone gave Tails the personal gifts they had for him.

After Rouge’s present of gourmet mint teas, Shadow was the only one left. The rest all knew what his gift was, and insisted that he go last. Doing his best to keep his hand from shaking, Shadow passed over the envelope.

(It’ll be fine, Blue reassured. He’ll love them.)

Tails opened it easily. He read the card first, because of course he did, before reaching in for the slips of paper still sitting inside.

It was almost comical watching his eyes widen until they looked like they might pop out of his skull.

“Are these…” His voice was weak.

“Tickets to Wicked. On Broadway,” Shadow confirmed. “They’re, uh, box seats? For privacy.”

“How the… How did you get these?”

“I helped Rouge rob the Smithsonian in July,” Shadow replied, as if they hadn't gone on at least six more 'field trips' since then. It was part of Rouge's agreement with Maddie, where they could go steal more jewels and get more money for the family as long as they also happened to get some artifacts back to the countries they belonged in. Rouge was already planning their third visit to the British Museum. “I had her buy them then. They were my end of the deal.”

Tails’s mouth opened and closed a few times before he propelled himself across the coffee table, wrapping his arms around Shadow. “Thank you!” He squealed. Shadow forced his nerves down so that he didn’t push the fox away. “Oh, thank you, thank you, thank you!” He turned to the rest of them, grinning. “Anyone wanna go to Wicked with me?”

The show wasn’t until March, during Spring Break. Tails never stopped talking about it, anyway.

At Shadow’s fifteenth meeting with Audrey, in the first week of December, he finally talked about Sonic.

He wasn’t sure why it had taken him so long. In a way, he supposed he wasn’t fully sure if he could trust her. There wasn’t much she could do with a lot of the information that he gave her, even as he mentioned ‘the Chaos Initiative’ and ‘Project Shadow.’ To properly talk about Sonic, though, to trust her with any aspect of the most important part of his life? That was much harder to do, and felt like a much bigger risk.

(Should I be flattered? Blue asked.)

(In a way, Maria said.)

He managed it, anyway.

“How are you today?” Audrey asked.

“Fine,” Shadow replied. “I had another nightmare. I can’t really remember it, though. Sonic was there when I woke up.”

“‘Sonic,’” Audrey rolled the name over her tongue. “You’ve mentioned him before. He shows up in a lot of your nightmares. Could you tell me about him?”

Before, Shadow had always ignored her. This time, he didn’t.

“He’s like me,” he said. “But… different. We fought at first.”

“Physically or verbally?” She asked.

“I pounded him into the ground two minutes after we met,” Shadow said. “I thought that… No, he…” He exhaled slowly, trying to calm his mind into something he could work with. “We were both… confused. He wanted to save the world. I wanted to destroy the world. He tried to stop me.”

Her brow creased. “What sort of saving-slash-destroying the world kind of stuff are we talking about?”

Shadow’s throat felt as if it was closed. He managed to reply anyway. “Do you remember the super-weapon that launched over London in the summer?” 

She nodded.

“I was the one who powered it,” Shadow said, ignoring the shock she seemed to be having a bit of trouble concealing. “The old scientist on board was— That was the Professor. Sonic, he—he came up to fight me, because I—I hurt someone important to him. We fought, and eventually I— He punched me to the moon, and I—I told him to just—to just end it. He—He didn’t, though. Instead, he backed away and we just— we talked.”

“What did you talk about?” Her pen never touched the paper, as if she was too enthralled in what he was saying. He hoped that she would get it all anyway. He didn’t think he had the strength to repeat everything.

“I’d thought— There hadn’t been anyone who understood what it felt like to lose Maria. Not even the Professor. But Sonic, he—he did. We— It was like our—like our souls were tied together. He helped me see that even though Maria is gone, the love that we shared is still here.”

She nodded, smiling slightly. “That’s beautiful, Shadow. One of the hardest parts of grief is finding the ways that we can remember those that we have loved and those that we have lost without reliving the grief all over again. I’m glad that Sonic was able to help you through that. He sounds like a good friend.”

(Too light a word, Blue sang.)

Shadow shook his head. “Not a friend.”

“Oh?”

“He’s…” Shadow scrunched his nose. “I— We don’t have a word for it. Neither of us do. It’s more than that, though.”

“We don’t always need words for things,” Audrey said gently. “Some things are too special for just words.”

“Sonic is.” Shadow set his jaw. “We— After we talked on the moon, he—he shared this—this power with me, and we went to go stop the Cannon before it could destroy the Earth. We fought together, and it felt like—like we were two halves of one whole. Then, we got in the way of the laser as it fired, and held it back while it was being misdirected. I—I could feel that—that power slipping away, though, and I tried to— I held onto it. It left Sonic instead, and he just— he fell. I watched him fall back to Earth and I didn’t even do anything. I just let him die.”

“But he isn’t dead,” Audrey pressed, “Is he?”

“No,” Shadow said. “He’s probably waiting for me right now. To be done. He likes to get cookies after.” He swallowed. “I thought he was dead, though. I—I went to find his family, so that I could apologize for—for letting him die. When I found out he wasn’t dead, I—” He couldn’t quite articulate it. “He thought that I’d died, too. When the Cannon exploded. We both thought we’d— I thought I’d lost him.” 

Audrey didn’t speak. She seemed to know that he had more to say, if he could only manage to get it out.

“It’s been months, and we can’t— It’s hard to make it through the night without each other,” Shadow murmured. “I have nightmares that he’s gone, or he has nightmares that I’m gone. Sometimes, I can’t quite— I’m not sure if he’s actually still alive, or if I’ve just been making it up this whole time, and I have to go check. Just to make sure.”

Audrey hummed. “Is there any way you could reassure yourself without having to remove yourself from your room?” She asked. “There is nothing wrong with the two of you making the conscious decision prior to going to bed to stay together rather than separate, but that’s not always a viable option. Is there anything you can do otherwise?”

(I’m right here, Blue echoed. Can’t you feel it?)

He wet his lips, feeling a bit clammy. “Our—Our souls are connected. When we’re close, I can—I can feel it. I know he’s still there.”

“Could you work on trusting that connection, then?” Despite the unnatural things he spoke about, Audrey took it all in stride. Frankly, it was impressive. “So that, one day, if you were worried that something happened to him or that he wasn’t there, you could simply check for that connection and see for yourself without ever having to get up from your bed?”

He hadn’t thought of that. Shadow wasn’t sure how viable it was. He hadn’t felt anything alive from that strange bond with Sonic unless they were in contact with one another. Still, he supposed it was worth a shot. “Okay,” he said.

“You have fun?” Sonic asked when the appointment was finally over.

“No,” Shadow said, face warming a bit as he saw the subject of his entire hour-long talk with Audrey. “Let’s go get cookies.”

“Oh, a man after my own heart,” Sonic grinned. “Mom and Rouge ‘re already there, and they sent me a pic of the monthly specials. One of them is hot chocolate flavored!”

“Isn’t that just chocolate?” Shadow raised an eyebrow.

Sonic laughed and held his hand tighter. “That’s what I wanna know!”

On the weekend before the last days of school leading up to Winter Break, Knuckles called a Meeting of the Tribe. They all piled into the sitting room. He stood at the front, a metal box of some kind on the floor in front of him. It radiated Chaos Energy.

(The Emerald? Blue suggested.)

(That’s the only thing that makes sense, Maria replied.)

“You all are likely wondering why I have summoned you here,” Knuckles said.

“Yes, because we were given literally no details,” Sonic said. He got a whack on the head from his youngest brother, and then was shushed by Tom before he could complain.

(Oh, everyone’s a critic, Blue scoffed.)

“Go on,” Maddie gently encouraged.

“Thank you, Mother,” Knuckles said. “As I was saying, I have come to the conclusion in recent months that better protection measures are needed in order for us to succeed in our sacred duty.”

“Oh, are we talking about the thing?” Sonic asked. 

Knuckles nodded. “Indeed. For some time, I remained quiet about it because I did not want to share information with those who were not members of the Tribe. Then, I did not want to share information with those who had… questionable pasts.” Despite his words, Knuckles did not look at Shadow. Instead, his gaze was firmly on Rouge.

She placed a hand on her heart in mock-offense. “Oh, I’m hurt, hun.” She snorted. “But fair enough. I didn’t originally plan on staying here, but…” She shrugged. “Plans change, I suppose.”

“And we’re happy to have you,” Maddie said.

“Wouldn’t have it any other way,” Tom agreed.

Even though she wiggled her fingers at them playfully, Shadow prided himself on being able to tell how flustered their words made her, wings perking up a bit where they sat over her shoulders.

(She loves us, Maria crooned.)

“Now,” Knuckles said, drawing the group back on track, “Our sacred duty is one of the utmost importance. For so long, I thought it mine, first and foremost. I have come to realize that… it is not good for me to take this on alone. It is not as safe, either. So, I come to you all, asking that the Wachowski Tribe continue the great legacy of the Echidnas and come together to protect the Master Emerald.” He pressed something on the side of the box and it opened, revealing the Emerald in all its glory. It was as bright green as he remembered, shining like Sonic’s gaze in the dark.

Rouge’s eyes widened. “The— That’s not really—”

“Yeah, it is,” Sonic said. “That’s how Shadow and I did the whole stopping-the-Cannon thing. The golden god thing. All that.”

Even though she had been living with the Wachowskis for months, it seemed as though everyone, conscious of her past and self-proclaimed 'best jewel thief in the universe' title, had been rather tight-lipped about their mystical family treasure around Rouge. It was for good reason, Shadow supposed, though maybe she would have benefited from a bit of forewarning.

“I have determined that the best way to keep the Master Emerald from falling into the wrong hands is to keep it separated,” Knuckles said.

Rouge made a choking noise. “‘Separated?’”

Knuckles took the Emerald out of the box and held it between his hands. He closed his eyes, grunted, and a bright glow shined through the cracks in his fingers. When he pulled his hands apart, the Master Emerald was gone, seven smaller gemstones sitting in its place.

“What the—”

“They’re Chaos Emeralds,” Shadow said before anyone else could. “The ‘little treasures’ I had in my pocket on our, uh, road trip.”

“We were traveling with the Gaia-damned Chaos Emeralds?” Rouge looked as if she wanted to either scream, faint, or throw up. Perhaps all three.

“This Tribe has seven members,” Knuckles continued, “Just as there are seven Chaos Emeralds. This will be our duty. Each of you will be entrusted with an Emerald, which you must keep safe at all costs. Should we ever need to utilize the Master Emerald’s power again, Ancestors forbid, we will combine them together.” He turned to Rouge. “I can only entrust this to you with the promise that, should it be necessary, you will rightfully return it.” 

There was mischief in her eyes, next to the shock. However, her gaze softened when she looked at him. “Don’t worry, Knucklehead,” she said. “All this is pretty hard to give up by betraying everyone. I don’t know if even a Chaos Emerald would be worth it.”

(Told you! Maria crowed.)

Knuckles nodded. “Good.”

The Emeralds were placed on the coffee table, allowing everyone to pick their own.

“What one do you want?” Sonic asked.

Technically, they were all the same. The same amount of energy flowed from them. They had the same glows and the same temperatures. The only difference came in the colors. 

Shadow glanced up and met Sonic’s gaze, bright like the Master Emerald’s hue. He turned back to the Chaos Emeralds, reached forward, and grabbed the green one.

(Subtle, Blue chuckled.)

Sonic cracked a smile. “I’ll take the red one, then,” he said, snatching the Emerald that was a striking match for Shadow’s own eyes.

As everyone else chose their own Emeralds, Shadow secured his in his quills. It was small enough that it fit there snugly, and it gravitated toward him, as if attracted to the life pumping through his body. 

That night, when Shadow lay alone in his bed, he pulled the green Emerald out and stared at it. Its glow was comforting and familiar. He closed his eyes, and felt a spark within his chest, like his soul coming to life. Somewhere in the distance, on a plane he couldn’t quite reach but could feel all the same, that connection with Sonic’s soul sprang into a new strength. He could feel Sonic’s Chaos Energy, lively and bright.

The Chaos Emeralds they each held onto had been part of what bonded them, he thought. It only made sense that the bond grew stronger with them in hand.

Despite that connection, Sonic still appeared to join Shadow in his room for the night. The Emeralds might have had many powers, but they did not stave off nightmares, it seemed. Shadow supposed that was all right. They had each other for that.

Two days before winter started, at his seventeenth meeting with Audrey, Shadow sat down on the couch and, before she could even greet him, he said, “I’ve been hearing voices. I hear Maria and Sonic in my head, and I’ve been hearing them since I thought Sonic died. They never go away, and even though I know they’re not real, sometimes they feel real. I don’t want to hear them anymore. I want them to go away.”

(Rude, Blue muttered.)

(Fair, Maria said.)

Audrey closed her mouth, crossed her legs, and leaned forward. “Okay. Let’s talk about that.”

When he finally left what felt like an eternity later, the weight was not lifted from his shoulders, but it had shifted, and that was something.

“You have fun?” Sonic asked.

“No,” Shadow replied. “But it was good. Really good.”

Sonic grinned and wrapped an arm around Shadow, pulling him into his side. “I’m glad to hear it. Really.” Their souls sang together, and Shadow didn’t think to look if it was a lie. He already knew it wasn’t.

Christmas was the following week. There were even more preparations than there had been for Thanksgiving. More chairs were added to the table, to account for Maddie’s sister, brother-in-law, and niece who would be coming to stay with them for the holidays.

Shadow helped with the cooking again. He vastly preferred being in the kitchen with Maddie to dealing with Tom trying to get Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles to agree on decorations. Rouge was recording on her phone as they fought over which color star to put on the top of the third tree in the house.

(I don’t know why they won’t just agree with gold, Blue grumbled, echoing Sonic’s arguments.)

“Who’s coming over?” Shadow asked as Maddie worked to finish preparing the macaroni-and-cheese. He passed over the spoon just as she needed it. He already knew the answer to the question in technicality, but he hoped to get a bit more detail.

“It’s my sister, Rachel,” Maddie said. “She… wasn’t the biggest fan of Sonic, but they didn’t get off to a great start. They’ve been working on it over FaceTime calls. Her favorite is actually Knuckles, but I think that’s because he’s the only one who wasn’t involved in ruining her wedding.” Shadow made a face, but there was no elaboration given as Maddie moved right along. “Jojo is her daughter, from a previous relationship. Her father is no longer in the picture. Jojo’s great, though. She loves all three of the boys and is very nice to them. She actually gave Sonic the first real pair of shoes he ever got, and we still buy them in the same style.”

“The red ones?” 

She nodded. Her stirring slowed a bit. “Then, there’s Rachel’s husband: Randall.”

Shadow noticed her hesitation easily. “Is there something… wrong with him?”

“Not necessarily,” Maddie said. “Randall is a wonderful man. He loves Rachel very much, he treats Jojo like his own, he is good to the boys. It’s just…” She sighed. “He’s a G.U.N. agent.”

(Maria sucked in a breath.)

Shadow bristled on instinct. G.U.N. still had no idea that he was alive, and he intended to keep it that way. “Will he tell them?”

“I don’t think so,” Maddie said. “Especially not if we explain the situation to them, which we plan on doing right when they arrive. I just… wanted to let you know, in case there’s anything about him that could give you a bit of a shock, if you get what I mean?”

He didn’t like it. He appreciated the warning, anyway. “Thank you,” he said. Then- “I think the chicken is done.”

She jumped, whirling around to face the oven. “Oh! Looks like you’re right!”

Rachel and her family arrived that evening, long after the sun had gone down. Shadow sat in the living room with Sonic as greetings were exchanged and introductions to Rouge were made. Everyone had on their special Sonic-designed gloves.

“You don’t want to say hello?” Shadow asked.

Sonic hummed against the crook of his neck. They were holding each other, because Shadow was nowhere near as good at hiding his nerves as he wished he was, especially from Sonic. Two heartbeats pounded together, in a rhythm that only they knew.

“I’ll see them for the next, like, five days,” Sonic replied. “I know where I’m needed.”

It was such a simple statement. It made Shadow’s heart soar.

They pulled apart as a cacophony of footsteps moved through the house, eventually making it to the room that they were in. Sonic’s hand was still in his, squeezing in reassurance.

“And there’s the other new one,” a new woman, who must be Rachel, said.

(Nice to meet you, too, Blue huffed.)

A young girl slid past her and skipped up to Shadow and Sonic.  Her tightly coiled hair was held back with a piece of cloth covered in pictures of reindeer.

“Hi, Jojo!” Sonic said, smiling widely at her. “I love your headband!”

“Thanks, Sonic!” The girl, Jojo, replied. “I like your sweater!” She turned to Shadow. “I like yours, too!” He and Sonic were wearing matching sweaters. She held out a hand. “I’m Jojo.”

“I’m Shadow,” he said, shaking her hand carefully.

“Oh, his name is cooler than yours, Sonic.” She laughed as the blue hedgehog sputtered in offense.

(No one has good taste, Blue complained.)

The new man, standing next to Rachel, stared at Shadow for a long moment. “Huh,” he said. “You weren’t kidding.”

Maddie shook her head. “Nope. Rachel, Randall, this is Shadow. Shadow, this is my sister Rachel and her husband Randall.”

Sonic’s grip was firm, and Shadow wondered who it was meant to be grounding. As it was, it might be both of them. As it was, that might be what they needed.

There were a few seconds of silence, during which Shadow didn’t think anyone even breathed. Then, Randall said, “G.U.N. believes you're dead, and from what I know and what I see, you want to keep it that way. Therefore, you might never hear it from my superiors, but, on behalf of all of us, thank you." He glanced at Sonic. “Both of you. Your efforts saved the world.”

Shadow opened his mouth, but the man cut him off.

“I never met him, but from what I know of Gerald Robotnik, he was not a good man, nor was he an idiot. He was not going to let his goals go incomplete. Whether it was through you or another energy source, he would have launched the Eclipse Cannon and he would have tried to destroy the world. We are lucky that you were there to help Sonic stop it.”

Shadow swallowed and said nothing, thoughts swirling. He had never considered that, but he supposed the man was right. The Professor was not someone to give up just because his first plan was out of reach. He likely would have found another way to power the Eclipse Cannon, even if Shadow had been fifty-years-dead by the time he was released from prison.

(He always got what he wanted, Maria murmured. And if he couldn’t, then he took it.)

“My husband’s right,” Rachel sighed. “And, Sonic, I suppose that after you save the world from domination or destruction three times, you deserve the… benefit of the doubt, so-to-speak.”

Sonic grinned, and Shadow could feel his giddiness. “Oh, you have no idea how great it is to hear you say that, Aunt Rachel.”

She raised an eyebrow and glanced at Maddie, who chuckled at her sister’s expression.

“We’ve been ‘Mom and Dad’ for a while now, Rachel,” Maddie said.

A blink. “Good lord,” Rachel said, mostly to herself, and then patted Maddie on the shoulder. “Well. Good for you. Whatever works.” Her words were confused, but her smile was soft, and Maddie’s was the same.

Rachel, Randall, and Jojo went to get settled upstairs. There weren’t any guest rooms left, and so the three of them were staying in Shadow’s room while he bunked with Sonic for the duration of their visit. When Tom had said that was the plan, he’d added on a mutter of, “It’s not like one of you won’t end up in the other’s room anyway.” Shadow supposed that was fair enough.

The meal and the gifts would come tomorrow. There were snacks to tide them over for the night, and Christmas movies that Shadow could remember seeing with Maria.

(Oh, I loved Rudolph! Maria exclaimed when it came on the screen.)

He leaned forward and watched a little more carefully.

At some point, Tails and Jojo started dancing in one room. In another, the four adults were catching up. As he went to grab some water, Shadow caught a glimpse of Rouge and Knuckles deeply engaged in conversation. She was watching him talk animatedly about something with a small, almost-dopey smile on her face. When she saw Shadow staring, he only gave her a thumbs-up that he hoped was encouraging and continued walking. On the way back, in the corner of his eye, he could see Rouge pressing a kiss to Knuckles’s cheek. 

Sonic was staring out the window when he returned. Snow had started falling as night did, and it was accumulating quickly on the ground. The flakes were large and fluffy, and already the layer that was there had covered every blade of grass in a thick blanket.

(I wish it snowed at the facility, Maria mourned.)

“You ever see snow before?” Sonic asked, keeping his gaze on the window.

“No,” Shadow said. “I think the base was too far south for it. Or maybe I was never allowed out when it snowed. I’m not sure.”

Sonic’s lips quirked up. “Okay. C’mon.”

He grabbed Shadow’s wrist, leaving the new glass of water abandoned on the coffee table. Sonic dragged Shadow through the house and toward the stairs. As they passed the room Rouge and Knuckles were still in, she threw him a wink and a discrete thumbs-up of her own. His face burned, and he moved to keep pace with Sonic instead of contemplating what she could possibly mean by that.

Sonic had to push against the window at the top of his attic room a bit to get it to open with the layer of ice around it. He got it eventually, shaking himself out as snow drifted down from where it was piling up.

“Is it not… dangerous?” Shadow asked.

“It’s flat enough right here,” Sonic said from the top of the ladder. “As long as we’re careful, we won’t slip. Plus, if we do-” He smirked- “I know you’ll catch me.”

He was right. 

Shadow followed Sonic up the ladder. The roof was a bit slick, but Shadow was able to find his footing rather easily, holding tight to Sonic’s hand once they were both standing.

“Wow,” he murmured, staring out at the snow that delicately floated down from the sky. It landed carefully on every branch of every tree, small icicles dripping down from the tips. It crunched underfoot. It was cold, but Shadow didn’t feel cold, not with the Chaos Emerald in his quills and Sonic’s hand in his.

“Beautiful, huh?” Sonic asked. “It didn’t snow where I was originally from, on Mobius. I never saw it in the three-ish years after that I spent on other planets. So you can imagine my surprise during my first winter in Green Hills.”

“Were you already in the cave?”

Sonic blinked. “When did I tell you about the cave?”

“You didn’t,” Shadow said awkwardly. “I… stayed there for a few days, when I first came here to—to apologize.”

“Huh.” Sonic looked back out at the snow. “Can’t believe no one ever mentioned that.”

The clouds that brought the snow were heavy, but Shadow thought he could see the light of the moon past them, just a bit brighter than the rest of the sky.

His throat hurt. There were words on the tip of his tongue, ones that he was sure he had to say, if he could only find the voice for them.

For a long few moments, they stood in silence, enjoying the steady snowfall and the untouched wonderland it seemed to make out of the world.

Then, Shadow spoke.

“I love you,” he said.

He hadn’t quite been sure what would come out when he opened his mouth. There had been a million things he could say. He supposed that one encompassed them all.

Sonic turned to him, just a bit startled. “You— What?”

Shadow swallowed. His throat was dry. His heart pounded. “I love you,” he repeated. “I think I have for a while. In a lot of ways. I just didn’t— I wasn’t sure— I didn’t know how to articulate it. I didn’t know what it was.”

Sonic laughed, a bit wetly. “God, we really are two halves, one whole. I’ve been dealing with the same kinda thing. A million things I wanna say, with no way to say them?”

Shadow nodded.

“I guess yours works, though,” Sonic said. “It’s true, after all.” He turned to face Shadow a bit more, green eyes glittering like jewels. “I love you, too, Shadow. A lot. And sure, was that probably helped along in the beginning by the Chaos Emeralds? Yeah.” He squeezed Shadow’s hand and gave him a smile that felt as if it could light up the whole world. “Doesn’t make that love any less real.”

Shadow’s eyes burned. Maria and Blue were silent, but he could still feel them there, hovering in the back of his mind. They might always be there. Maybe, though, he could learn to live with that.

“I’m not good at this,” he said quietly. “I don’t know how to be good at this.”

“That’s okay,” Sonic replied. “Me neither. We can figure it out together, though.”

His throat bobbed. He looked out at the snow again, the tranquility of everything around them. “That doesn’t sound so bad.”

Sonic let out a breathy laugh and reached forward to Shadow’s face, brushing aside one of the stray tears that had managed to fall. The hand held there, then, cupping his cheek, and Shadow thought that he might be able to stay there forever.

“What is it that Rouge always says?” Sonic murmured.

“‘Wanna go on a field trip?’” Shadow offered.

Sonic snorted. “I was thinking something more like ‘rip off the band-aid,’ but thank you for the contribution.”

“I live to serve,” Shadow said.

“No, Shadow.” Sonic rubbed a thumb over his cheek and smiled. “You live for yourself.”

It was a joint decision. At the same time, they both leaned forward, and their lips pressed together, cold and chapped and dotted with snow, and the harmony that their souls sang crescendoed into a melody that might be heard from space.

“Holy moly,” Sonic said when they both pulled away, and then covered his face with his free hand. “Oh my god, I did not just have my first kiss and say ‘Holy moly,’ I’m gonna kill myself.”

“Please don’t,” Shadow said, a bit breathless. “I wanna be able to do that again.”

Sonic glanced at him and laughed. “I suppose I can make an exception.”

They did not kiss again. Maddie called them down a few minutes later to say goodnight to everyone, after a quick talking-to about standing out in the snow long enough for ice to form on their quills.

When everyone went to bed, though, they scrambled back into the attic and Sonic said, “I know that Christmas presents are supposed to be tomorrow, but I wanna— Well, I think it’ll be better if I just give you this one today.”

“Okay,” Shadow said skeptically, but watched as Sonic scurried to a drawer and dug through it until he found what he wanted.

It was a small black box. He set it on top of the table in the middle of the room and then pulled Shadow down to the floor. Their sides pressed together as they settled into the nest of pillows and blankets piled in front of the foot of the bed. Sonic glanced at him, eyes sparkling, before he pressed a button on a tiny remote in his hand.

The box whirred, and then a moment later a beam of light shot up from it. 

Shadow blinked, and the ceiling was covered in stars. 

They bent weirdly over the support beams of the attic, but that didn’t matter. It looked like the night sky, with constellations that he could recognize from when Maria had pointed them out, a lifetime ago.

“I asked Tails to make it,” Sonic murmured. “In exchange for like, five favors. Worth it, I think.”

They sat in silence like that for a long time, staring at the steadily shifting stars projected onto the ceiling above. Somehow, deep in his bones, Shadow knew that the stars they were seeing were the same ones that rested just beyond the clouds that brought endless snowflakes down onto Green Hills.

The gift made him want to cry. Sonic had looked at him and had gotten him something that would matter to him. The specially-designed gloves, with stars and planets and the moon, sat warm on his hands. He and Sonic leaned against one another, shoulder-to-shoulder and heart-to-heart, and for a moment Shadow couldn’t think of a single other place in the universe that he should be. 

After an eternity bottled into only an hour, Shadow spoke.

“You asked me once if I— You told me that I should forgive myself.”

“Yeah,” Sonic said. “I did.” A beat. “Have you?”

“No.” Shadow looked back at Sonic and couldn’t help the smile that graced his face, returned almost instantly with one as bright and beautiful and alive as ever. “But I think I’m starting to.”

Sonic squeezed his hand and used his other one to pull Shadow a bit closer. He pressed a kiss to Shadow’s temple and wrapped his arm around him, and the two of them sat there, on the floor of the attic, watching the stars as the snow fell outside, until sleep found them.

And though it would not be the end, on this night, held tight and safe and close, with a soul humming in tune, Shadow didn’t dream.

Chapter Text

When he woke up, the first thing that Sonic thought of was Shadow.

He felt a bit bad about it afterward. His dad was injured, the world was in danger, and yet the moment that he could think again, his mind flew to the alien that he had met barely a day ago.

Still, there wasn’t anything to do about it. Consciousness slammed into him like a freight train—or like that car Tails hit Knuckles with on the night they all met. His limbs were floaty, and he flailed on instinct, gasping for air that wasn’t quite meant to be there.

He was in space, wasn’t he? He was in space with Shadow. Their souls were singing the same tune, and their hearts beating the same rhythm. Sonic blindly reached out for him, but he couldn’t—

He wasn’t—

Where was he?

“Shadow?” Sonic tried to call, but his voice cracked and broke over the word. His throat was impossibly dry. His ears were ringing. Something was missing.

He coughed, and it rattled in his chest. His head was pounding, and as his brain crawled its way back to reality it brought waves of pain with it, becoming more intense the more thoughts he managed to cobble together.

Where was he? He could remember the feeling of the Chaos Emeralds slipping away, taking both their power and his consciousness with him. There was a heat, searing along his side, but it was nothing compared to the ripping within his chest just before everything went dark.

Falling, then? He wasn’t in space—he couldn’t be, not if the Emeralds were gone and yet his lungs still worked—so he must be falling. The ground was so far and so hard, and he had been knocked into it more times than his pride cared to recall. He would know if that was what had woken him.

He was suffocating. Or he was drowning? He was reaching out for something that wasn’t there—

“-breathe, sweetheart, come on-”

…He knew that voice.

Sonic blinked rapidly, and the blur of darkness and platinum and gold in his vision spotted away, and he could see a familiar face hovering over him.

“Mom?” He rasped.

Maddie smiled gently, but her shoulders shook with a sigh of relief. “There's my baby,” she said softly. “Welcome back.”

He blinked again, and his eyes hurt. Maddie noticed, because she was wonderful like that, and sent a scathing glare—one that he was proud to say had never been aimed at him, because even the worst ones he’d earned always had the healthy warmth of her love behind them—that seemed to result in the steady dimming of the lights.

“How are you feeling?” She asked, turning back to him.

“Fine,” Sonic replied. He wasn’t really sure how accurate the answer was, because there was certainly pain laced into every facet of his body, but the numbness beyond it told a tale of painkillers already in his bloodstream. 

Maddie didn’t look convinced, but he didn’t care. He didn’t want to go back to sleep now. He had questions.

Sonic opened his mouth, and then closed it abruptly, clamping down on the words that had been forming. “Where’s Dad?” He asked a moment later. It was probably better than asking her where Shadow was, at least at first.

“He’s okay,” Maddie replied, and a weight was lifted from his chest that he hadn’t known was there until it was gone. “Well, he’s going to be okay. A few broken bones, a couple of cracked ribs, a bit of internal bleeding. He’s all fixed up now, though. Don’t worry about it.” She scrunched her nose teasingly. “You’ll be in the hospital longer than him.”

He jerked. There was no way. “What? Why? I don’t need to be in the hospital, I’m in tip-top shape. I’ve never been better!” Every part of his being, inside and out, was burning, but his mom didn’t need to know that. She had enough to deal with.

She raised a singular eyebrow, though, and he thought she might have figured it out on her own. If only she was Tom. It was so much easier to get stuff by him.  

Tom. God, Sonic wasn’t quite sure how to feel about… that whole thing. On one hand, Maddie seemed confident enough that he would be all right. On the other hand— broken bones, internal bleeding? That didn’t sound very good. That didn’t sound ‘all right.’

“How—” Sonic wet his lips. They were annoyingly chapped. “How long—?”

“About two days,” Maddie said. “You— Knuckles and Tails caught you, when you were falling. A ring got you back to Green Hills, and G.U.N. took it from there.”

“G.U.N.?” Sonic asked, eyes wide. “But they— Didn’t we steal from them? Are they not mad about that?”

“Oh, they definitely are,” she conceded. “But it seems that saving the world goes a long way with at least a few of the higher-ups. They’re covering the medical costs. Said it would be a bad look if you died on them after all this.”

“Their kindness knows no bounds,” Sonic said, tone as dry as his mouth was.

Maddie chuckled. “Certainly not.” She reached past him, and when her hand reappeared in his view, a glass of water was in her grasp. “Here. You must be thirsty.”

The water hurt on the first swallow, courtesy of his throat wanting to show off its Sahara Desert cosplay, but by the time he was halfway through the glass, it was pleasantly cool instead.

She took the glass back when he was finished, and had barely placed it back down when Sonic, unable to resist anymore, asked, “Do you— What happened to Shadow?”

Her brow furrowed. “That’s right. He helped you at the end, didn’t he? Your brothers mentioned it.”

He nodded as firmly as he could. “Yeah, we— After we fought, I— We ended up on the Moon, and we just…” Sonic bit down on the end of his tongue for a moment, trying to ground his thoughts. “We talked. He—He realized that what he was doing was—was wrong, and I realized that… Even though he did a lot of bad things, he did them because he was—he was hurting. He—He missed his—his Maria so much, and he didn’t…” Sonic shook his head. It was hard to explain. Even if he could, he thought it might be hard for someone to understand if they hadn’t been there. “He helped. At the end. He wanted to make things right.” He met Maddie’s eyes, saw the conflict swimming within. “Does anyone know what happened to him?”

She stared at him for a long moment, and as each second dragged on he could hear his heartbeat hammering just a bit louder. Eventually, Maddie sighed. It didn’t look as though she was happy to say what she planned to, but she held his gaze anyway, because she was good like that. 

It didn’t make her words any easier to swallow.

“From what Tails could figure from the G.U.N. files he dug up, the Cannon was likely overloading. I don’t remember exactly what he said, but it sounded like it was going to blow up, and if it happened too close to the Earth…”

“No more Earth,” Sonic finished, even though it made the ache in his chest flare.

Maddie inclined her head. Her jaw shifted and then set, and then she said, “Robotnik did a—a livestream, as it happened. He said he was saving the world instead. It— Well, it looks as though he and Shadow worked together to do that. Robotnik kept the Cannon together for as long as he could, while Shadow pushed it away from the Earth.” She pat Sonic’s knee through the sheet over it. “And then it exploded.”

His fingers flexed desperately, twinging with stiff pain. “But—But Shadow had the—the Chaos Emeralds. Those would’ve— They would’ve protected him. They had to.”

She looked sad. He hated when she looked like that. “Sonic—”

“No, Mom, you don’t— He— They had to protect him, they would’ve— That’s what they do—”

“Like they protected you?” It was soft, but still felt like a knife through his heart.

His breath hitched. “They—” His words failed, and his eyes were stinging, and he thought he might cry. “He can’t be— Mom, he can’t just have…”

Her hand came up to brush along his forehead. “I’m sorry, sweetheart.”

“No, he’s not— He can’t—” His pleas were unheard, said to a deaf universe that turned a blind eye to his tears and instead pulled into focus the pain in his soul, raw and burning and empty where something was meant to dwell. Perhaps that was what did it for him; the black hole within his chest that for a few glorious minutes had been filled with a melody he thought he’d known all his life. Now that it was gone, the quiet was so overwhelming, he thought he might drown in it.

Sonic grabbed at Maddie’s arm, ignoring how it made his side throb. “Mama—” The word came out like a sob, and he grit his teeth against it. “He can’t just be gone.”

She didn’t reply, but she did fold him into a careful embrace, cautious of the bandages that covered half of his body. Her fingers made careful strokes against the unwrapped fur she seemed able to reach, and he couldn’t bring himself to return the hug. Every ounce of energy was gone, drained alongside the hope he hadn’t realized he was clinging to until it was too late. Sonic squeezed his eyes shut, frame shuddering with devastation he barely understood, and cried into his mom’s shoulder until he ran out of tears.

There was often someone with him.

It wasn’t all of the time, but while he waited until the G.U.N. doctors who barely understood his biology decided that he was well enough to sit and do nothing at home rather than sit and do nothing in a hospital bed, Sonic rarely found himself alone. 

Those same doctors floated in and out at random intervals, asking questions with clipped words that he responded to just as curtly. They didn’t seem to respect him, so he saw no reason why he should respect them. 

His family made for much better company. Tails and Knuckles arrived with Maddie the morning he first woke up. He was still drained, mind preoccupied with a few-too-many thoughts about bright red eyes and fur turning platinum and a common song. His brothers seemed to understand, at least to some degree. After delicate hugs that Maddie monitored—especially from Knuckles—they perched on the bed on either side of him and rambled away until the problems of the world felt a bit more distant.

Tails chattered on about a million different things, his mind moving nearly as quick as Sonic’s could. Knuckles had once wondered if Tails did have heightened Chaos Energy the way that they did—the way that Shadow had—but manifested it in his brain rather than anywhere else. Tails had poked him in the side and said that Chaos Energy didn’t make someone smarter, and then spent an hour explaining the results of an experiment on it he had read years ago, until Sonic and Knuckles tackled him in a joint effort to make him stop. 

In between Tails’s ramblings, Knuckles updated Sonic on the ‘status of the Tribe.’ Most of it was what he had gotten from Maddie: she was fine, Knux and Tails were a bit banged up, Tom was injured but recovering, and Sonic had managed to get the worst of it, because some higher power was probably jealous of how cool he was and wanted to knock him down a peg. The joke was on them, then, because their efforts only made him cooler every time he survived.

The most interesting bit (and most concerning) was the note about the Master Emerald. It was missing, from what Knuckles said. Sonic knew that Shadow had been using its power when he’d— at the end. He supposed it wouldn’t have just stuck around. 

Tails was trying to scan for it, breaking into satellites and using tactics that Sonic thought might get him scouted by both the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. before he was out of middle school. Thus far, they hadn’t had any luck.

Things could never be easy.

They tried to ask him about Shadow, too, but it was clear that Maddie had at least said something about Sonic’s fun little breakdown, because Tails danced around the issue as easily as he danced along to the soundtrack of whatever musical Maddie fancied playing while they cleaned. Even Knuckles was careful with his wording, which Sonic thought might actually be a first for him.

He appreciated it in a way, but he also wished that they just wouldn’t talk about it at all. Shadow was a constant presence in his mind—a shadow if you will (Sonic liked to think he was funny). The utter lack that he felt permeating his bones only grew more apparent with every fleeting mention, every pitying glance and pat on the arm his brothers sent his way.

They left for dinner, and then stayed for another hour before Maddie ushered them home for bed. Sonic was left with a kiss on the forehead, twin smiles, and a hole in his heart.

It could be worse, when he was alone. Tails and Knuckles had brought along some of his comics, with the former picking what he knew to be some of the favorites and the latter appearing to have grabbed the first stack he saw. He wouldn’t have expected anything less.

There was a television, too, but the remote was left on a table in the corner, and Sonic didn’t feel like calling in a doctor or one of the G.U.N. agents roaming the halls to grab it for him.

Instead, he listened to the buzzing of the fluorescents overhead until his ears were ringing and peeled open the first comic book his fingers found, fumbling with the pages until he turned to a random one. The colors were bright and loud, and Sonic couldn’t focus on any of them. His eyes glazed over the words and the pictures, and his mind seemed adamant to not comprehend a single one of them.

His thoughts wandered, instead, to Shadow. They had fought—hard and bloody and angry—and then they had stopped. He remembered sitting on the Moon, latent Chaos Energy warming their blood and recycling the oxygen already in their lungs. He remembered whispered secrets and broken words, and quiet realizations that had reverberated through the stars. He remembered a soft touch, so gentle despite the harm it had once caused, the harm it could cause. 

When Sonic had tapped back into the Emeralds’ power, he didn’t hold it for himself. Rather he’d shared it, openly and willingly, and Shadow had reciprocated, something springing to life between them. It had felt like a piece of himself that he hadn’t ever known he was missing.

Their fur was alight, gold and platinum, and perhaps there should’ve been even the tiniest sliver of apprehension, but there wasn’t. All at once, Sonic knew Shadow as intimately as he knew himself, and there was no reason for him to fear. None at all.

Sonic closed his eyes, tight. Thinking about that time hurt, because it brought to the forefront exactly what had happened after. 

He and Shadow had danced around one another, two halves of a single whole, a perfect harmony. Despite how they soared through space, Sonic could always feel Shadow in the back of his mind, the Emeralds lighting that connection between them and making it shine. 

Then, though, they’d been above the atmosphere, fighting against the laser as it did its best to put an end to Sonic’s home, and all of the people that he had come to care about. He and Shadow didn’t touch, but they might as well have. There was a steady presence next to him, lending him the strength and the willpower he needed to hold on for a little longer.

The Emeralds left. He wasn’t quite sure how, or why, but their power slipped from his reach, and Sonic’s frantic grasping for them did nothing. As the Energy retreated from his veins and the gold faded from his fur, there was a burst of pain all along his left side. It was followed almost immediately by the tearing within his soul, an agony so intense that he welcomed the darkness with open arms.

And then he woke, with the burns bandaged, the Earth safe, and his soul shattered in a way it never had been before.

Sonic wondered if he’d ever be able to properly explain it to his family. He liked to think that he could do anything if he put his mind to it, and talking to them was one of the easiest. Still, the thought made his throat clog and his head pound and his pulse quicken. 

The others didn’t like Shadow. There was no way they did. He had beaten most of them into the ground, nearly killed Tom, and tried to destroy the world. Sonic shouldn’t like Shadow. And yet he did. He thought he should keep that quiet.

His brothers noticed, because of course they did.

It was on the third day that he was awake. Tails had control of the television, and had put on the Wicked movie. Frankly, it was impressive, because that movie wasn’t meant to come out for months, meaning that Tails had hacked his way into Universal Studios and gotten an unfinished-but-almost-finished copy of the film for himself. Sonic supposed he shouldn’t be surprised. Wicked was his little brother’s favorite musical, and Tails was nothing if not dedicated to his passions.

Even despite that passion, he paused it in the middle of “Popular” to look at Sonic with furrowed brows.

“What?” Sonic asked. “Have I got something on my face?”

Tails huffed, fingers fiddling with the bedsheets.

Sonic glanced at Knuckles. “What’s his problem?”

“He is concerned for you,” Knuckles replied. “As am I.”

“‘Concerned?’” Sonic sputtered. “Guys, I’m fine. I mean, I’ll be better when I’m out of this stupid hospital bed and can actually stretch my legs, but other than that—”

“Sonic,” Tails cut him off. “You don’t have to lie to us.” He screwed up his face, the fluffy ears on the top of his head drooping. “We know that—that you’re feeling bad.”

“What?” Sonic let out a bark of laughter. “Dude, I’m not feeling bad! In fact, I dare say that I feel better than anyone in history! No one’s doing it like me!” He let the grin fall into something more akin to a comforting smile. “Don’t worry, buddy. Everything’s good. I’m just a little tired, is all.”

“That’s not it,” Tails insisted. He leaned forward a bit. “You were tired after the last fight with Robotnik, when you first used the Master Emerald. You were tired when we stayed up late for days waiting to see if Knuckles would ever come home. This is different. Even if you’re tired now, it’s— There’s something else.” Sonic opened his mouth to reply, but Tails took his hand and held it tightly, looking at him imploringly. “We’re not stupid. You—You can tell us the truth.”

Knuckles nodded. He was a steadying presence, as he always was, and perhaps that was what convinced Sonic to take in a shaky breath, clench his teeth, and speak.

“I wish Shadow was here,” he said. It could have been more delicate, but Sonic didn’t think he cared too much. His brothers’ eyes widened. “And I—I know that that sounds stupid. I mean, he tried to destroy the world , but I just…” He groaned and buried his face in his hands. “We—We talked, when we were on the Moon, and he just— He lost the most important person in the world to him, and then they locked him away for—for fifty years, and the only thing he had to keep him company was the memory of her death. Of course he was mad. He hurt Tom, and I nearly killed him. I couldn’t help but think…”

“You were in his shoes,” Tails offered when he couldn’t finish. “You were feeling how he was feeling.”

Sonic nodded. “Then, when we went to stop the Cannon, we— I shared the Master Emerald’s—or, well, the Chaos Emeralds’—power with him, and we… I can’t really describe it. It’s like I… We felt like two parts of one—one whole. I knew where he was, and I could feel almost echoes of his emotions. I— If we hadn’t understood one another already, there’d be no way to avoid it.” He swallowed. “And now he’s gone, and I don’t… I’m not sure how to go back to how I was before.”

“You can’t,” Knuckles said simply. “The power of the Master Emerald—or the Chaos Emeralds, what have you—may come and go from a being as it pleases, but that does not mean it does not leave its marks. There are many an old saying about it, but one more relevant here than any I believe: ‘Chaos is power… Power enriched by the heart.’ There are many interpretations, and many meanings behind it, but one thing that it tells us is that just as the Emeralds turn thought to reality, they amplify the emotions of their wielder. In the case of wielders, I do not see why it would be any different.”

“It didn’t stick around last time, though!” Sonic exclaimed. “When—When I fought Robotnik with them the first time, I felt those—those amplified emotions. They went away when the Emeralds were gone. So why is it sticking around this time?”

Knuckles’s face screwed up, and he gave Sonic a steady pat on the knee. “I’m afraid not all things in the realm of this power offer explanation, Hedgehog. That is one of the first things that young Echidnas were taught— There may not be an answer for everything, especially where the Master Emerald is concerned. It does not mean that those questions are any less deserving of being asked.”

“I want an answer, though,” Sonic grumbled. 

“You really miss him, huh?” Tails mused. He sounded sad.

Sonic’s heart ached, just as his soul did, and he nodded. “I do,” he said.

He recalled a saying Longclaw had taught him, one that he had always known. He had never used it for her, because she’d been rather stern about the meaning, and it didn’t fit the grief he had for her.

For Shadow, though—

“I miss him like the sun misses the stars,” Sonic murmured.

Tails furrowed his brow, but Knuckles sucked in a breath. He supposed if anyone would understand the saying, it would be Knuckles. For all that Tails was Mobian, he was not from Mobius, not like his two older brothers were. He did not get the meaning behind such words.

“That is truly how you feel?” Knuckles asked. He sounded more somber than Sonic may have ever heard.

“Maybe,” he said shortly. 

“I don’t get it,” Tails said, looking between them. “What am I missing?”

“It’s an Ancient Mobian legend, Fox,” Knuckles explained. “From before even the Master Emerald. It says that there were once two suns in the sky, and the day was twice as bright for it. Without any light, though, the night had no one watching over it, and was twice as dangerous. The world turned far too slowly, the suns content together, and so when the night came, it brought death for weeks on end with it.

“The early Mobians prayed for protection from the horrors of the dark, and the second sun heard their pleas and decided to help. It could not fit into the darkness as it was, however, and so split itself into the stars, which were laid into the night sky and were enough to bring safety and comfort to the mortals. The stars did not mourn the life they once had, for they could no longer remember. 

“The first sun—now the only sun—did remember, however, and it did mourn. It wished to see the second sun—the stars—again, and so tried to, but it never could, for its light drove the night away. It never stopped trying, and chased the stars forever, making the days and nights shorter, into what they are now. ‘Like the sun misses the stars’ comes from that. It is a type of grief, that which will sit forever, one half never again to be whole.”

Tails’s voice was strained, and a bit wet, as he said, “That—That sounds like such a burden.”

Sonic set his jaw. “I’ll bear it for him.”

Silence fell.

He stared down resolutely at his lap, not wanting to see the emotion in his brothers’ eyes. He fumbled for the remote, resting against his sheet-covered leg. “Turn the movie back on. I wanna get to ‘One Short Day.’”

Maddie visited later than night. She hesitated in the doorway, something conflicted within her gaze.

“You good, Mom?” He asked. “You look like you saw a ghost.”

She blinked, opened her mouth, and then paused. After a moment, she let out a sigh and then smiled at him gently, even as her face was lined with exhaustion. “Nothing for you to worry about, sweetie. Not while you've gotta focus on healing. It's just been a… stressful few days.” 

Sonic snorted, and didn’t attempt to shove any amusement into it. “Yeah,” he muttered. “Feel you there.”

Everyone seemed a bit more on edge when they came the following day. Knuckles and Maddie came in the late morning, having visited Tom first. They didn’t do too much talking, mostly keeping him company, and he actually found that he appreciated the calm—though he’d never admit it. He was still drained from the conversation of the previous day, and wasn’t sure he could handle any deeper topics than the weather.

“When’s Dad getting out?” Sonic asked as the current episode of Gravity Falls came to a close.

“It’s looking like tomorrow evening,” Maddie replied. “And as long as there aren’t any setbacks, you should be good in three days.”

Sonic pumped a fist. “Yes! I am getting so sick of not being able to move!”

She raised an eyebrow. “It just means you’ll be resting at home instead of in the hospital, bud. No running for you for at least a few weeks.”

He deflated. “Mom! I can’t just— I'm a growing boy! I’ve gotta get out and about!”

“Your natural Chaos Energy is likely attempting to heal you, Hedgehog,” Knuckles said. “But if you use your abilities, it can do the exact opposite. You should listen to Mother.”

Maddie nodded firmly. “Yes, precisely. All of you should listen to me more, if we’re being honest, but that is a conversation for, I’m sure, many different days. For now, you’ve just gotta rest.” She rubbed a thumb over his unbandaged cheek. “We only ask because we care about you, Sonic.”

“I know,” he said, shoulders slumping. “It just… It sucks. I’ve never been so—so stationary.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” she chuckled. “I can only imagine what it must have been like when you were one-tenth the size and just as fast.”

“Incredible,” Sonic responded, and grinned when she laughed. 

Maddie returned alone that night to put him to bed. He could insist another time that he was too old for a bedtime story, but at the moment there was nothing he wanted more than to listen as her soothing voice lulled him to sleep.

They were only on the second page when there was a knock at the entrance to the room. Maddie wrinkled her nose and set the book down on the sheets, moving to open the door.

“We’re actually getting ready to go to bed in here,” she said.

“This will only take a minute, Mrs. Wachowski,” a sharp voice replied. There was something familiar to it, but Sonic couldn’t quite place it. The door opened the rest of the way and Maddie slid back to his side as a group of G.U.N. agents flowed into the room. At the head of them was the owner of the voice, that woman from the G.U.N. headquarters in London: Director Rockwell.

“Good evening, alien,” she said, eyes as cold as her tone.

“Uh, dude, I saved the world a few days ago,” he said, crossing his arms even as the bandages made it a bit difficult. “You could at least use my name.”

“The world would not have needed saving had you not interfered.”

“Yeah, really bold of you to assume that literally two of the smartest people in the world wouldn’t have figured out another way to get the second key,” Sonic shot back.

Her lips drew into a thin line. “That is not what we are here to discuss,” she said after a moment. “We simply have a question for you. If you do not wish to cooperate, we will find the answer on our own.”

Hmph. They didn’t really deserve anything from him, he thought, but he couldn’t help but be curious. “What is it?”

Another G.U.N. soldier passed something to her, and she held it up for Sonic to see. His heart skipped a beat, and he thought he might forget how to breathe. 

It was a golden ring, with a dent on one side and scuff marks along its surface. It was Shadow’s ring, one of those that he had worn around his wrists and ankles. Sonic could remember his fingers brushing against that dent, as he was able to feel every intricacy of Shadow’s existence despite the gloves and any space between them.

Somehow, it had made its way through the explosion, back to Earth, and into G.U.N.’s possession.

Exactly where Shadow wouldn’t want it to be.

“Confirm identification on this object,” Rockwell said.

Sonic’s mouth was a bit dry. “It’s— It was Shadow’s. One of the rings that he wore. I remember the little— the dent on it. It’s his.”

Rockwell hummed. “Good.” She passed it back to the soldier and said, “Put it in Storage D, label ‘Inhibitor’. We’ve no more use for it.”

“Wait!” Sonic cried, a bit too strangled for his liking, but it certainly got her attention. “You’re just— You’re putting it in storage?”

She looked a bit amused, as if his fear was entertaining to her. “What else would we do with it?”

There was nothing left of Shadow, no body to bury or bones to lay to rest. The facility he had grown up in had been half-consumed and half-buried in rubble, turning any broken glass and tattered photographs that remained into dust. There was a phantom hand in his, and a song in his soul that was missing its chords. “Give it to me,” he said. 

Rockwell didn’t smile, but there was a sickening amount of satisfaction in her gaze as she answered curtly, “No.”

The door closed behind the G.U.N. agents, and Sonic pressed his fists into his eyes to stop them from stinging, and ignored any of Maddie’s attempts at comfort.

Shadow was gone. He was gone, gone, gone, and there wasn’t anything left to even prove to Sonic that he had lived except for the fractured heart that managed to beat on in his own chest.

The following day, Tails and Knuckles visited in the morning. Maddie was home getting things ready, and no one would be coming later in the day as Tom would be arriving home. Sonic felt a pang of jealousy and shoved it down as far as it would go. Only a few more days. 

And then a few more weeks until I can do anything of substance, Sonic added bitterly.

He struggled to enjoy his time with his brothers, mind still stuck on Shadow’s ring, locked away in some storage room to rot.

“What’s going on, Sonic?” Tails asked at some point, noticing how preoccupied he was. “Is something wrong?”

“Nah, nothing’s wrong, buddy,” Sonic said. “Just thinking about some stuff.” He tapped his fingers against his knee rapidly and then said, “Actually, now that I think about it, I am kinda thirsty. Would you mind grabbing some water, Knux?”

His older brother nodded solidly. “I will be back as soon as I can.”

As the door closed behind him, Tails asked, “He does know that he can just… press the button, right?”

“Probably,” Sonic shrugged. “I think he likes the mission of it all.” He turned back to Tails. “Speaking of missions…”

“What is it?”

Sonic pulled out his phone, kindly delivered to him after the first day. He typed quickly and turned the screen to Tails.

‘Looped?’

Tails glanced at the security camera in the corner of the room. “They can’t hear us,” he replied. “I checked. I’m sure they wish they could, but you were doing pretty bad, and I guess they didn’t have audio installed in their individual medical rooms for privacy reasons.”

Sonic snorted. “Bet Rockwell’s pissed about that now.”

“Surely.”

He went back to drumming his fingers. “No one else is coming today, right?”

Tails frowned and shook his head. “No. Dad’s coming home tonight, and Mom wants all-hands-on-deck to make sure he doesn’t get himself killed or something. She said if you want someone to come, though, we can figure it out—”

“No, no,” Sonic waved him off. “That’s not it.”

“What is it, then?”

Sonic ran his tongue over the back of his teeth before asking, “At around eleven tonight—my time—would it be possible to make it so that the camera in the corner of the room there only sees one peacefully sleeping hedgehog, even if said hedgehog is, perhaps, not peacefully sleeping?”

Tails scrunched up his nose. “I mean sure, but, Sonic, you’re not supposed to even be out of bed, even with help. What could possibly—”

“Tails,” Sonic cut him off. He tried to make his voice as steady and firm as possible. “This is important to me.”

“Sonic—”

“Please.”

A beat of silence.

Tails sighed. “Fine,” he said. “But I’ll only do it for thirty minutes. You better be back in bed by then.”

“Of course, little buddy. They don’t call me ‘Sonic ‘Fastman’ Wachowski’ for nothing!”

“That’s so stupid! No one calls you that!” Tails whacked him on his good shoulder, but he was giggling as he did, so Sonic considered it a victory.

That night, after spending about an hour studying the map of the facility he also managed to get Tails to send him, Sonic pretended to be asleep for about forty-five minutes until his alarm for eleven-oh-one went off, along with a text from his youngest brother. ‘Done.’

The most difficult part from that point was actually moving. Sonic had stood a few times in the past days, mostly to use the bathroom, but it was a completely different beast getting up to leave the room all on his own. 

He was already ten minutes into his thirty when he made it to the door. That was all he needed, though. Tails wasn’t looping the rest of the cameras, meaning that Sonic had to be moving faster than them to avoid being seen. 

Sending a quick apology to his family for doing the exact opposite of what they wanted him to, Sonic pushed for his powers, feeling a surge of Chaos Energy as he did. He took a deep breath, recited his route, and took off.

It wasn’t a long time, but it felt like it. Sonic’s body ached as blue light flickered over it, and he weaved past different G.U.N. staff as he zipped through the hallways, finally making it to ‘Storage D.’ The door wasn’t even locked, which he almost felt offended at on Shadow’s behalf.

The ring was there, sitting atop a pile of assorted items and machines, as if it didn’t mean anything. ‘Unsorted,’ the pile was labeled, and he supposed that was better. Hopefully, no one would miss it then.

Sonic snatched the ring—the inhibitor, Rockwell had called it—from the pile and wasted no time in heading back to his room, retracing his steps and collapsing in his bed the moment that he was close enough.

He pulled the sheets over his legs and placed the ring in his lap, turning it over in his hands. He rubbed a finger over the dent, feeling the damage through his glove.

This was Shadow’s. This had sat on his wrist, kept him company, through everything. Sonic’s fingers grasped both sides of it, and he closed his eyes, trying to imagine that there was a hand slid through the ring’s opening, fingers that met his own.

There was nothing, though, just memories of a ghost.

Sonic leaned back against the pillows, a few stray tears managing to slip past his eyelids. The ring was dull and lifeless, but it was Shadow’s, and that meant something.

At midnight, when a G.U.N. agent poked their head in to make sure that he was where he was supposed to be, Sonic’s breathing was even, the blanket was pulled up to his shoulders, and beneath the sheet, Shadow’s ring rested against his heart.

When Sonic woke up the next morning, the side-effects of his jaunt through the facility were immediately apparent. More pain coursed through his body than had the rest of his time in the hospital, and he did his best to keep his mouth shut about it, because there was only one real explanation for why he’d gotten so much worse, and he really did not want to have to talk about it.

Thankfully, any thoughts of such a thing were chased away rather quickly when the door around noon and Tom walked in.

“Dad!” Sonic vaulted off of the bed and almost instantly crumpled to the floor. Every ache in him flared, and he let out a whine of pain through his teeth. “Oh, bad idea, that was a very bad idea.”

“Sonic!” Arms came up under him and lifted him back onto the bed. Maddie ran a careful hand over his quills, brushing them back. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, it’ll take more than that to take me down,” Sonic replied. “Though maybe don’t come asking for help stopping any more death lasers for about two, uh, business months.”

“Duly noted,” Tom said, sliding into the chair next to him. Sonic met his gaze, and almost immediately his throat started hurting.

“Dad,” Sonic breathed. “You’re here.”

“Yeah, bud, ‘course I am.” Tom smiled in that same way he always did at Sonic, with taut cheeks and crinkled eyes. Bruises snaked up his neck, and his arm was in a cast, but he was here. “Got out yesterday, but I couldn’t go another minute without seeing my favorite guy.”

“Don’t let Tails hear you say that,” Sonic said, words choked.

“Oh, yeah? Not Knuckles?”

“Nah.” Sonic grinned despite the wetness of his face. “He’s gunning for Mom’s favorite, instead.”

An hour later, Tom sat on the bed with him, Sonic curled up against his side. Maddie was off finding food, determined to get something better than what was delivered when they asked the nurses. They were watching a Marvel movie, because Sonic didn’t think he had the energy to properly appreciate any of Keanu’s work, as Tom’s good hand carefully carded through his quills.

“I was so scared,” Sonic murmured. Tom turned down the television volume.

“I bet,” he said. “It was scary for me, too. I’m sorry you had to see that, bud.”

“I almost killed him,” Sonic said. “I—I wanted to. I wanted him to hurt, like how you were hurt, like—like how I was hurting.”

Tom hummed. “What happened?”

Sonic swallowed. “I remembered what you—what you said to me. In my old cave, when we saw the old drawing of Longclaw. You—You told me that I didn’t let my pain change who I was. I didn’t— I had no idea if you were okay, but I had to— It could have been the last real talk that we ever had, you know? I couldn’t just pretend it meant nothing.”

“Well, I’m proud of you, bud,” Tom said. “Even in someone that was like an enemy, you were able to find the good, and you were able to pull that good out of him.”

“It was always there,” Sonic mumbled, half into Tom’s side. “It was just— Shadow was in so much pain, and I didn’t even realize it. He didn’t know what to do with it, with any of it. He didn’t realize that, even though it hurts, we still have to—to remember the good things. That even though people are gone, the love we have for them isn’t.” 

“When did you get so wise?” Tom asked, but there wasn’t much teasing in his tone, only fondness. “You should take your own advice, you know. I know you don’t have many memories with him, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t appreciate the time that you had. Maddie mentioned those… echoes you were feeling, right?” Sonic nodded. “Hold onto those. Shadow didn’t want to be defined by his pain, at the end, so don’t let that pain define who he is to you . Let the good do that instead.”

Sonic’s eyes stung. He thought of the words that Shadow had spoken on the Moon, breathed with near-reverence. “‘The light shines, even though the star is gone,’” he whispered.

Tom didn’t understand the significance, but he also seemed to realize that it wasn’t the time to ask. Instead, he said, “Yeah, it does,” and drew circles into the fur of Sonic’s arm, letting the silence reign and allowing a steady heartbeat to slowly bring him back from the Moon to Earth.

Right around four-thirty, Knuckles arrived, pushing open the door as the tell-tale glow of a portal closed behind him.

“Hey, Knux,” Sonic said, “What’s up?”

“Mother has requested Father’s presence for dinner,” Knuckles replied. “Apologies for interrupting.”

Tom glanced down at Sonic. “I can stay if you—”

“Oh, no, no, no,” Sonic said, shoving at Tom as lightly as he could. “You’re not using me to get out of family dinner, young man-”

“‘Young man?’”

 “-go on home, have a mai tai, spend time with your wife.” Sonic grinned as Tom snorted. “‘S not like I’m going anywhere.”

“For once.” Tom got off of the bed, moving quite a bit slower than he usually would, and pressed a quick kiss to Sonic’s forehead. “Someone’ll be back to stay with you for a bit after dinner,” he said. “Don’t worry.”

“Pft. I never worry. I haven’t done that once in my life. Worrier? I hardly know her!”

Tom blinked and then shook his head. “God, I can feel my age.”

“Frankly, I’m surprised it took this long,” Sonic said sagely. “You’re falling to pieces, Tom. Your bones are practically dust.”

“Okay, okay, I get it, you brat,” Tom chuckled. “We’ll see you in a bit. Get some rest.”

Sonic protested—even though that was exactly what he planned on doing—but still waved goodbye as they stepped into the hallway and through another portal that Knuckles flicked open.

Maddie arrived around nine at night, looking distinctly frazzled. She smiled when she entered his room, though, eyes sparkling.

“Hey, sweetie,” she said. “I’ve got some good news.”

“I’m actually totally fine and allowed to run again?” It was a long shot, but about the best news he could think to hope for.

“Unfortunately not,” she replied, and slumped back against the pillows in defeat. “But how would you feel about getting out of here?”

Well. It wasn’t the dream, but he supposed he would take it.

For some reason or another, G.U.N. insisted on driving him home. It was some blend of pride and not quite knowing how ring travel could affect his injuries—which was stupid, but Sonic didn’t have the energy to argue. They were at a G.U.N. base in Seattle, so it would be about eight hours to get to Green Hills, and it was already rather late. Montana was an hour ahead of Washington, so it was ten there when Maddie arrived, and it wasn’t for another long while until the transport was ready.

She offered to stay with him, but Sonic took one look at the exhaustion painting every one of her features and told her to make sure the couch was primed for when he got home. She clipped on a tracker from Tails in response—one that would alert them all if it deactivated, stopped for too long, or went too far off course. Half-a-dozen kisses peppered his forehead, and he gave her hand one more squeeze before G.U.N. loaded him into the vehicle and shut the doors behind.

The ride was long, but it was night time, so Sonic was perfectly happy to just go to sleep. The rumble of the road beneath the wheels reminded him of his ride with Tom to San Francisco. It was the last long road trip he’d been on, and Sonic almost missed it. Not the whole getting-shot-at-and-blown-up part, but the calm times in the car, just seeing the sights with the first friend he’d ever made.

Sonic wondered how often people’s first friends became their dad. It probably wasn’t a regular occurrence? Maybe he had a record for it. Dad Speedrun, Any Percent, No Major Glitches.

Was being an extremely lovable, extremely handsome alien considered a glitch? Sonic didn’t think so.

There weren’t any windows in the car he was in, so when he finally woke up he had to fumble for his phone to get any idea what time it was. Nine-thirty in the morning . They had to be almost there.

They were. Not even twenty minutes later, the car pulled to a stop and Sonic heard the opening and closing of doors before a G.U.N. doctor loomed over him. The straps holding him to the bed were removed and he was unceremoniously dumped into a wheelchair. The doctor ignored his complaints, pushing him down a ramp and out into the sunshine. 

Oh, how he had missed the outside. It was glorious, the warmth against his fur, pushing even through the bandages over his left side. The leaves of the trees waved overhead, and the sky was a pleasant blue beyond. His house sat in front of him, 55 Plymouth Road, and Sonic thought he had never been happier to see it. It hadn’t even been destroyed this time!

His parents were waiting on the porch, and did not hesitate to embrace him. Maddie’s eyes were red as she spoke with the doctor about how exactly to handle his recovery, and Tom sniffled before patting him on the shoulder. “Welcome home, bud,” he said. 

Knuckles helped him up to his room, with Tom not really being in the right shape to do it himself. “The fox is dealing with… something else,” Knuckles said when Sonic asked. It was obvious when his older brother was lying, but Sonic didn’t particularly care. He was sure that he would find out soon, anyway. If Tails didn’t want him to know, then he didn’t want him to know.

His room was just as he’d left it, if not a bit more clean. Knuckles guided him over to the bed, uncharacteristically gentle, and declared that he was going to ensure that G.U.N. left them in peace sooner rather than later. It gave Sonic a bit of time alone to simply sit on top of his comforter and appreciate being home again.

Things were the same here, and yet he felt irrevocably changed. Hidden under the sheet that he’d managed to keep draped over his lap, the dent in Shadow’s ring was a comfort. He pulled the ring out. There was no reason to conceal it anymore, he supposed, other than to save himself from any embarrassment. His family could be so needlessly cruel , as if there was anything about him—the coolest member of their group—that could be made fun of.

He heard the G.U.N. vehicles eventually rumble away, but made no move to get up. He would surely get a lecture if he tried to descend from the attic without any assistance—even though he definitely could—and he really wasn’t looking for one of those at the moment.

Sonic wasn’t sure how long he sat there, finger gliding along the groove of the ring, body rocking ever-so-slightly, as if trying to remember what running felt like. Eventually, though, the peace was shattered by a deafening boom. The entire house trembled, and when it stopped it was replaced by the hammering in his chest.

What was that?

Leaving Shadow’s ring on the bed, Sonic got to his feet and swayed momentarily, blood rushing to his head. He blinked spots out of his eyes and staggered over to the nearest window, peering outside. He couldn’t see much of the backyard, but he was positive that there wasn’t supposed to be a group of dark figures. Tails darted through the air while Knuckles jumped with bursts of red energy.

What was going on? Who were those guys?

Sonic’s blood was already cold, but it completely froze as a net managed to snag his little brother out of his flight, bringing him to the ground. Knuckles was over him in a second, trying—and failing—to free him. The remaining dark figures didn’t immediately descend on them, instead moving off to something else that Sonic couldn’t see. Tom? Maddie? He didn’t know. He had to find out.

His entire being burned as he tried to call on his Chaos Energy. Where normally his abilities came to him as easy as breathing, he was drained, and while it might have been his body trying to protect him from overdoing it, Sonic found himself unappreciative. His family was out there, in danger. He had to help them.

He would have to do without, then. Sonic barely avoided falling down the ladder, but he made it out of the attic, staggering toward the stairs and making his way down as quickly as he could without face-planting. He grabbed a ring from the bowl at the front door and headed for the back. Dust clung to the air in the sitting room, and as Sonic limped his way toward it, the vague chaos outside was broken.

Tails, high and desperate, screamed, “Sonic!”

And he ran.

A crack popped in his ears as he shattered the sound barrier, Chaos Energy surging through him as he slammed into the last two dark figures he could see. He hurled the ring, a portal opening beyond it to the first not-Earth planet he could think of. It clicked closed as the figures soared through, and Sonic landed in the grass, pain coursing through his blood.

His eyes wandered, surveying the yard. Knuckles and Tails were staring at him, mouths agape, even as the latter was still stuck in the net. Any thoughts about helping with that vanished, though, as his gaze met one just a few steps away.

Red on green, blood on emerald, Sonic felt every bit of air leave his body.

“Shadow?” He asked, because what if he had finally cracked, what if this was a trick of the light? Morning sun shifted with the silhouettes of leaves over dirtied black fur, though. His heart beat, and his mind raced, and he was real, so why couldn’t this be, too?

“Sonic,” Shadow breathed. It was the first time that Sonic had ever heard Shadow say his name, and it made that broken song within his soul erupt into a new symphony, bright and renewed. 

Against all odds, the Sun had found the Stars, and as Sonic clung to Shadow as tightly as he could, feeling his heart beating in his chest and his soul singing a tune that he’d never heard and always known, he swore that, for as long as he lived, he would never let go.

For now, that might just be enough.

-   fin.   -