Work Text:
“And will that be all, sir?” The rabbit cashier smiled at him expectantly, waiting for him to ask for a bag.
“Yes. Thank you.” He saw the rabbit’s ears droop in disappointment, the sight reminding him of someone so familiar with a pang. “On second thought… I might need a bag or two.”
Her eyes lit up and muzzle twitched excitedly as she instantly handed him two shopping bags, cheerfully bidding him farewell as he left the shop. He looked back with a smile until the automatic doors closed behind him, shielding him from the store inside. He looked down, sighing at the unnecessary carrier bags he had just bought, shaking his head as he thought to himself.
Shadow the Hedgehog really had gone soft with old age.
He passed by a decrepit empty building with an intact pane of glass, and peered at himself in the reflection. Shadow smoothed down his quills nervously, though they had grown way too long for anyone to recognise him, swooping down to halfway down his torso before curling up once again. He had tied the top two up into a half-up style — a remnant of Amy’s touch seeping into his daily life. He watched as the tips of his mouth curled up into a grim smile in his reflection. It seemed everywhere he went, at least one thing would remind him of the past. He pulled down one of his quills, grimacing as he saw the red roots peeking out once again between the mass of black. He would have to redo the dye he had applied last week.
It was strange: just two small changes was enough to completely mask his former self, but on second thought, his personality had appeared to have done a complete flip too. That probably hid him better than his appearance.
He made his way down the streets, taking in the large billboards and towering buildings that eventually faded into abundant greenery and the hard tarmac turning into luscious grass beneath his feet. He took a deep breath in, stilling in the grassy plains he had walked into. It really was a blessing they had managed to defeat Eggman finally, Shadow was certain that this reality wouldn’t have been able to exist with him in it. He gently sat himself down on the grass, and removed his leather jacket, letting his back quills spike up and relax. He breathed a sigh of relief at no longer being restricted.
“Watcha’ got there, Shadow?”
“Coffee beans.” He replied, not looking up to the source of the sound. “I didn’t get shit for you.”
“Aw man…” It was Sonic who groaned in frustration, floating above the black hedgehog playfully. He idly played with his quills, grimacing at the red roots. “Uh, Shads, ya got a lil’ something on ur quills.”
“I know, but I just came back from the shop… I’ll go tomorrow.” He fell back, facing up to the sky and Sonic, who peered back down at him.
Sonic was the one who had changed the most out of the two of them: his presence radiated warmth and hope, quills wafting gently in an invisible, permanent breeze, eyes shining a brilliant green that glowed. There were specks of gold embedded into his quills, remnants of the last and final time he had gone super, condensed into fully gold tips at the ends. While not a ghost, he had an air about him that made him seem not fully physical on the planet.
Shadow thought he looked beautiful.
“I like the way you did your quills.” Sonic said idly, sitting down next to where Shadow lay, eyes closed, and playing with the grass in front of him. “Reminds me of Ames.”
“I thought so too.”
He chuckled to himself sadly, “I miss them… sometimes.” He looked up to the sky, where the shining sun and the half-destroyed moon sat, having formed its own rings from the debris. “It’s stupid, I know, but it’s just— it’s been so long since I’ve last seen them… I’m starting to forget.”
Shadow opened his eyes and looked to his right, to Sonic. His brows were furrowed, and though he still wore his classic smile, his eyes had become glassy. Shadow thought he had never looked so despairing.
He sat up and outstretched an arm to the blue hedgehog, who looked up at him in surprise. Sonic grinned, before lunging towards him, arms wrapping around his waist. Shadow gently brought down his arm to wrap around Sonic, and the two sat together, entangled.
Shadow brought up a hand to sift through Sonic’s quills, closing his eyes and taking in the smell of nature and beauty on the hedgehog. The feeling of warmth deepened as he held onto him for longer, not unlike his super form. He could hear Sonic softly purring as he continued to massage through his quills absently, head resting aside his own.
“Hey Shads?”
“Hm?”
“Do you remember that last time?”
The sentence was vague and offhand, but Shadow knew exactly what he was referencing: how could he ever forget?
The last time Sonic had gone Super.
‧₊˚‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
Eggman’s destruction had been awful, it was so much worse than the war, it felt overpowering. Shadow didn’t think he’d ever seen so many dead bodies in his life, that much blood, tripping over something and knowing it was probably someone’s discarded arm, or lopsided head he had just kicked. He was sure he had seen enough gore to suit him for the rest of his life (funny… immortal life at least). When Sonic had gathered him and Silver, Shadow’s first thought was of how awful he looked. He had figured out why quite easily: being the token hero meant you had to do nearly tenfold of what the average helper would be doing. And yet, seeing the blood splattered on the hero’s front, the claw marks and scrapes and bruises and bites — Gaia knows what even bit him, probably a scared citizen, trapped and panicked — he couldn’t help but feel it was all unfair for Sonic.
The blue hedgehog looked up to meet Shadow’s gaze, and he noticed with a pang the darkness beneath his eyes. “I need both of you to help me.”
“Of course!” Silver piped up immediately. Shadow looked over to where he stood and noticed how he was also bathed in blood. Though to a lesser extent than Sonic, the white of his fur made it stick out clearer. “What do we need to do?”
Sonic reached up into his quills, wincing as what Shadow now confirmed was a harshly set dislocated shoulder was aggravated, and pulled out all seven chaos emeralds. He turned his gaze down to the glowing gems circling his hand, then up to the two hedgehogs before him, determination overpowering the exhaustion set deep in his eyes. “We all need our Super forms for this. Eggman has a main mech in the centre of the city, where he’s overseeing all the actions of his badniks. Within the mech he had a small chamber where he’s keeping some mobians, and of course, his main power supply. Silver—“ He looked up expectantly, his five white quills standing up as he stood to attention. “—I want you to save each and every one of the prisoners. There are a lot of them, but I’m hoping that the benefits of using your Super form will let you get them all out faster. If the power supply is shut down and you aren’t finished, it could be fatal, for both you and the people.
“Shadow.” Sonic stared at him for a long time, emotions flitting on his face faster than he had time to decipher them. “I want you to handle the power supply. I know you have become more familiar with technology recently, and I’m betting on this fact to make you work faster.” Sonic was referencing the hours he had recently been spending in Tails’ workshop, while the young fox took great efforts to teach him the basics of robotics and engineering. He wouldn’t deny it was intriguing, but severely complex. His admiration for Tails grew the longer he spent learning. “Do not slow down for Silver. Just believe he will work fast enough and try to shut down the mech quickly.”
“And you? What will you be doing?” Shadow asked before he could stop himself.
Sonic gave him a classic grin — one that looked so stale as he couldn’t find the energy to make it as genuine — and merely replied, “Well someone’s gotta distract him, haven’t they?”
He held out his hands for Silver and Shadow to take, and the three of them stood in a circle, as the Chaos emeralds left from Sonic’s side and began lazily circling the trio. As they sped up, Sonic spoke once more, “The burst of chaos energy that will come once the emeralds are used will attract Eggman here immediately. I want you two to run, run as far as you can away from here. If it works, he will hopefully see only me and think I am the only one in the Super form. Stay safe, stay sharp, and most importantly—
“Never falter in your task.”
Shadow’s vision was filled with a brilliant blinding light as the emeralds merged into the three of them. He felt the energy surge through his body, empowering him all the way to the tips of his fingers. He clicked off his inhibitors, and feeling the chaos energy run free inside him revitalised him better than any amount of rest could have done. As the beam of light that had encompassed him, Silver and Sonic faded, he remembered his first instruction, and took off at a high speed, a burst of wind from behind him telling him that Silver had done the same in the other direction. Looking up to his right as he circled around, he saw the giant mech making its way over to a floating, golden Sonic facing him. Despite how far away he was from the pair, he heard Eggman’s voice loud and clear coming from them.
“Of course you have shown up once again, rodent.” He spat out the term venomously. “However, you are far too late. Take a look around you, Sonic. It’s over. All your efforts are in vain. You see the skyline? See the trails of smoke? The Red tinted sky? This marks the beginning of the Eggman Empire finally, and I’ll make sure to kill you last, just so you can see how perfectly you have lost!” He punctuated the last word with a swipe at Sonic, who easily dodged.
Shadow reached the back of the mech, floating up to inspect the surface carefully for any important-looking panels. He could no longer see Sonic, but could barely make out his voice.
“You sure have some big promises for someone facing me with the chaos emeralds. What happened to your usual cowering, Eggy? I think I miss it.”
“Be quiet.” Another swipe, another dodge.
He finally identified a panel that seemed out of place compared to the rest of the other parts, and latched onto the body of the mech via a stray pipe sticking out of the helm. He drew his claws out, and gently wedged it in between the cracks between the panel and the armour. A harsh cry that was unmistakably Sonic’s voice sounded out, and Shadow froze in place.
Eggman’s maniacal laugh followed. “Talk all you like, but never think that maybe there’s a reason I know I’m going to win this time. Seems like even after all this time, your younger brother is smarter than you are.”
He steadfastly tried to ignore the splatter of blood that came from in front of the mech, prying open the panel quietly as possible. He had an idea why Sonic wasn’t moving out of the way of his attacks: probably so Shadow wouldn’t have too much trouble dealing with cutting the power.
However.
Sonic had turned Super so many times by now, the chaos energy in his blood was enough to rival his own, even though he was engineered with the level of power in mind. He had noticed it last time, and the time before that: while Super Sonic was powerful, he had been growing lethargic quicker and quicker the longer he used the emeralds. It was taking a toll on his body that Sonic — in classic Sonic Style — completely ignored over the needs of everyone else. A stupid feat, if he hadn’t been a hero. Else it was considered noble.
Shadow couldn’t shake the feeling this was also part of the reason why Sonic wasn’t moving. He resolved to work faster, pulling off the cover and getting to work with the tangled mess of wires inside. He frantically sifted through the jumbled mess, trying to remember from Tails’ talk which wires were important and which were not.
Finally, he plucked one of his quills out and severed a few of the wires in a triumphant flourish, and was rewarded with the sound of every robot in the vicinity powering down.
Eggman let out a frustrated cry. “What on Earth has happened now?!”
“Hate to break it to ya, Egghead, but I’m not the only one who wants to see you gone today.” Sonic curled into a spindash, and zapped straight into the Center of the mech, sending it toppling to the ground now that it was completely out of power. Shadow quickly retreated as he felt the robot fall backwards, chaos controlling out of the way as it crashed onto the charred surface below.
Shadow himself didn’t remember much else of what happened beyond this. He remembered Sonic recounting the tale to him later on and telling him he had destroyed the robot to scraps out of fury, but he had no recollection of doing so. Maybe it was blind rage.
Eggman had been killed that day. Not by Shadow’s hands, surprisingly, but by Sonic’s own. He had crawled out of the heap of scrap that used to be his mech, coughing and wheezing, only to be met with a golden glow that he instantly recognised. Looking up, he found himself being greeted by Super Sonic himself, staring down at him with a disappointed expression on his face. “Robotnik.”
Eggman flinched at the use of his real name, so unlike Sonic’s regular taunting.
“I believe that everything you have done today is my own fault.” He turned his gaze from the doctor, over to the burning horizon before them. “I should have known.” His stare hardened as he looked down scathingly at him once more. “Should have known that no matter how many chances I have you, you would never take them, never try to change. But this ends here and now.”
Sonic placed a gentle hand on the doctor’s forehead, closing his eyes in concentration, and Eggman slowly saw his vision go white.
By the time Shadow and Silver had caught up to him, Eggman was lying limply on the ground, with Sonic staring down at his unmoving body, facing away from the other two hedgehogs. Silver tentatively tried to call him, and he turned around to face them.
His expression was one of grief, brows creased, eyes glassy.
‧₊˚‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
“I felt genuinely bad for him,” Sonic let out a laugh as he looked back on that time, “and I felt guilty for feeling bad for him.”
“You never liked killing. It was understandable. He’d been with you longer than any of us had been.”
“But then I collapsed.” He met Shadow’s gaze, still smiling, but the expression held no joy. “And I thought I was being punished for killing him. It was ridiculous, considering he’d done much worse, but I don’t think I’d ever been so scared.”
‧₊˚‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
Sonic had cried on Shadow’s shoulder for at least 5 long minutes, Silver offering the comforting words Shadow couldn’t get himself to bring out from the overbearing shock of the situation — both the fact Eggman was dead and that Sonic was being so vulnerable.
The sobs slowly eased out, and when Sonic brought his head back up, he seemed so irreparably exhausted. “I…” His voice sounded quiet, and alarm bells immediately began ringing in Shadow’s mind. He was ready when the hedgehog went slack in his hold, catching him before he hit the ground.
“…Sonic?” The first word he had spoken, he hadn’t expected to sound so desperate.
Silver held two fingers against the limp body, paling as he whispered, “I can’t feel anything.”
“What do you mean, you can’t feel anything?!” He hissed at him, before trying the pulse himself.
“Please tell me I did it wrong.” Silver looked at him urgently for an answer. “Shadow, please.”
He looked at the white hedgehog, dumbfounded. “I can’t feel it either.”
‧₊˚‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
“We couldn’t find your pulse.” Saying it now didn’t hold the same fear and panic that the fact had brought him before. “It was terrifying.”
Sonic merely hummed in assent, closing his eyes as Shadow continued to card through his quills. “But I came back, didn’t I?”
He scoffed, “So what? Still scared us to death.”
‧₊˚‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚
Shadow remembered gently laying the bleeding body of the golden hedgehog down, unable to support him with his arms any longer. The shriek he heard come from in front of him and the flurry of footsteps as Amy came rushing over to them both.
Remembered watching as she cried over his battered and bruised corpse, the gold slowly fading from his body as the chaos emeralds accepted his death.
He had been acquainted with death before: Maria’s death, the death of anyone who opposed him, deaths he inflicted. And yet, all of this was new. It was domestic. He had never seen regular mourning, and he admitted that it was just as bad as when he couldn’t find the time to grieve.
He stood up, looking down at the beaten body with a grief-ridden grimace. Amy had later told him that it was the closest she had ever seen him to crying. He had scoffed at the time, saying it took a lot more for him to shed tears, but her words held some element of truth in them.
Maybe it was a minute, maybe it was an hour, maybe it was a day, but eventually the rest of his friends had walked away from him, leaving Shadow all alone with what was Sonic. He kneeled down by the blue hedgehog, and gently cupped his cheek, staring intently at the closed eyes before him. He tightened his grip momentarily, before letting go, Sonic’s head falling back to the ground with a soft thud.
A brilliant white light blinked across Shadow’s vision, long enough for him to know it wasn’t his body doing it. His eyes instantly snapped to Sonic’s face, hoping foolishly it was a sign something happened, that he would sit up and tell him that he looked stupid with the look on his face—
A thin white glowing crack appeared at the base of his forehead.
The thin hair-like strand grew deeper, extending down his body, to the very end of his feet, smaller cracks branching off of it, while Shadow stared in horror. What was happening to Sonic? Was that his fault? The body caved open like a shell—
A glowing, gold-speckled Sonic sat up, looked over to Shadow, and said with a grin, “You look stupid with that look on your face.”