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Sonic’s voice pierced the air. “I don’t know either, okay! But let him go!”
Shadow raised a hand to shove him out of the way. His eyes bore holes through Sonic’s pleading gaze. They briefly flicked down, to where Silver was flying away in a golden streak. Fighting every thought in his mind screaming at him to do otherwise, Shadow obeyed Sonic. He did not pursue Silver.
Sonic relaxed when Shadow let out a sigh of resignation. He then turned his attention back to Silver.
The other hedgehog had become a small shimmer of light by now. The person Silver chased after, Mephiles, couldn’t even be seen against the pitch-blackness below.
“Try not to go too far down, Silver!” Sonic yelled, cupping his hands to his mouth as if that would help project his voice.
Shadow opened his mouth to chime in, but he was abruptly interrupted by another yell. It came from Rouge. He spun around to see both the bat and Princess Elise crouched on the edge of the debris.
“Hun, where are you going?!” cried Rouge.
“Be careful, you two!” added Elise. Her fingers dug into the stone she knelt on. “D-Don’t hurt each other!”
The distant wails of the plummeting half-god could still be faintly heard. Their echoes only made unease further sink into the crowd watching helplessly from above. Knuckles and Tails appeared disturbed as well, and even Eggman and Omega had fallen silent.
Sonic briefly considered diving after Silver and Mephiles, but that would be hypocritical of him after he’d just told Shadow to let them be… And could he even reach them at this point? Could he fly faster than they fell?
A pale blue light growing brighter beside Sonic caught his attention. He turned to see that the remains of Solaris’ body were fracturing and drifting apart. They were glowing, and a faint hum began to fill the air.
“Crap, not good!” Sonic tackled Shadow away from the fragments. No sooner than he did, the bits of quartz and stone exploded. Brilliant blue light flooded the abyss.
Sonic and Shadow braced themselves, but… the blast didn’t hurt at all. It was merely light. Quite a beautiful light, at that, made even more incredible when billions of colorful streaks shot out of the center of the burst. It was all the souls the god had consumed.
A smile fell upon Sonic’s face as he watched them scatter. Each soul on its own wasn’t too bright. But combined, they gave the illusion of countless shooting stars lighting up the darkness.
Elise and the others all breathed deep sighs of relief. The princess clutched her chest, a grin tugging at her lips as the magical scene unfolded before her. However, the moment was short-lived.
She couldn’t forget about the two hedgehogs far, far below.
Her eyes drifted back down to where they had fallen. Silver’s glow was just bright enough for her to see…
Suddenly, another shape appeared. Elise squinted, seeing a faint purple orb where Mephiles should have been.
What was…?
Silver flew into the orb. In the blink of an eye, his golden glow was gone. Then the blip of purple vanished, and there was no sign of either anymore.
“What? Wh-Where did they go?!”
All heads turned back to the princess.
Sonic looked into the abyss below. He couldn’t find any trace of the two.
Shadow dove without a second thought. Sonic made no effort to stop him this time. Thanks to his speed, he reached the blackness that Silver and Mephiles had fallen into much faster. There was… nothing down here.
The only remnant of them was a strange tingling sensation Shadow felt in a certain area. It made his fur briefly stand on end, and that was unfortunately familiar.
Whenever Mephiles used his purple spheres to whisk either himself or Shadow to another time and place, Shadow was always left with the same prickling in his skin. The feeling faded as quickly as it had come, but it was enough. Enough for Shadow to know what had happened down here.
Letting Silver chase after Mephiles on his own was a mistake. He was a fool for believing that the outcome might be good. Silver deserved his faith, but Mephiles did not. Shadow had only thought about what Silver might do… not Mephiles.
He cursed to himself under his breath.
That error in his judgment was all Shadow could think about as he flew back up to the others with clenched fists.
“Where’d they go?” Sonic asked as soon as Shadow was within earshot.
Shadow drifted to Sonic’s side. His eyes trailed across the anxious expressions of the others. Elise and Rouge held their breath. As Shadow explained, he fidgeted with the cuffs of his gloves. “Mephiles has the ability to create spheres of his energy that can transport anyone who touches them to another time and place. That’s what he did.”
Elise blinked. “So… So where are they now?”
“I… have no way of knowing.”
Sonic held up his hands to calm everyone. “Okay, okay. That’s fine. They’ve been transported, not killed. Everyone’s still alive.”
“But Silver is-!”
“In his Super form!” Sonic blurted, shushing Shadow. “He’s invincible. What’s anyone gonna do to him? Mephiles could take them both straight into a pit of lava, and the guy would be fine.”
Shadow fell quiet to consider Sonic’s words. He made a good point. Silver was untouchable. Still, wondering where they had gone troubled him to no end. Mephiles could drag them to any timeline he desired, and Silver had no means of returning to where or when he belonged.
Amidst the silence that had fallen over them, Rouge was able to detect a small sound. Her ear twitched. “Hey,” she muttered, getting everyone’s attention, “You hear that?”
Tails furrowed his brows. Now that Rouge mentioned it, his ears had begun to pick up on something, too. It sounded like faint… wind? There shouldn’t be wind in this pocket of space… “Yeah. I hear it, too.”
The sound gradually became loud enough for the others to notice as well. It was, without a doubt, wind.
Debris in the void started to move. Faint rumbling and creaking noises joined the wind as the rubble shifted.
Sonic and Shadow, who hovered separately from the debris, noticed the changes immediately. “You’re moving up,” Sonic shouted.
All eyes went up to whatever the source of the pulling force was. There, at the top of the abyss, a rift was widening. Through the tear in reality came white light too strong to see what may have been on the other side. The bigger the rift grew, the faster everything floated towards it.
Knuckles held his ground as the piece of debris they stood on rattled. “What the heck is that?! We can’t get sucked up!”
“Wait!” said Dr. Eggman. His voice caught the others by surprise. Ever since being teleported into this place, the doctor had been uncharacteristically quiet… probably because he knew full well that this mess was mostly his fault. Tampering with the halves of a time god didn’t pay off… Who could’ve guessed? Now, though, Eggman raised his voice and stood boldly. “Lookーall the souls are going into that rift! Willingly, it appears.”
He was right.
All around them, the souls were swirling together and swimming up into the light. They didn’t seem to be forced to go, either, not with the way they freely danced about on their way up.
While observing this, everyone noticed one other thing: the debris was mending itself as it grew closer to the rift. Ruined pillars rejoined, rubble turned back into proper walls of the palace, and even the chunk of castle balcony they stood on now was moving towards another piece of itself.
The two masses collided abruptly. The platform quaked, and all standing on it lost their balance. Just as they stood back up, it rumbled again. It was… rotating.
Elise cried out as the floor beneath her started to turn, and that endless blackness below crept into her view. Her hands scrambled to find anything to hold onto.
Sonic swooped down from above and picked her up. “Gotcha! C’mon guys, we gotta get out of here!”
Tails and Rouge didn’t need to be told twice. They were airborne in seconds. It took Omega a moment to kick on his thrusters, but he soon joined them above. Eggman opened his mouth to shout for assistance as well, but Shadow was there to carry him before he could say a word.
Knuckles sunk the spikes on his fist into the chunk of balcony as it now rotated to an almost complete ninety-degree angle. “You know I can’t glide up, right?!”
Rouge snickered at him. “Aw, you need help, big boy?”
“No shit!”
Still giggling to herself, Rouge hooked her hands under Knuckles’ arms and lifted him. “My, what big muscles you have.”
“Not as big as your mouth…”
“Guys!” snapped Tails, “Does this look like a good time to bicker?”
Rouge rolled her eyes and began flapping her wings with more vigor, carrying both herself and Knuckles up to the rift.
Sonic stayed close to the others as they flew, occasionally pausing to kick aside debris that might collide with them. He couldn’t do too much, though, not with Elise in his arms. Thankfully, Omega switched his hands into guns and opened fire on any piece of rock even remotely in their way.
Shadow darted straight to the rift, reaching it before anyone else.
Eggman held a hand up to shield his eyes from the blinding light. “Don’t you want to let someone else go first?”
Shadow scoffed. “No. If this rift only leads to oblivion, we should be the ones to know.”
“But-!”
“It’s what we deserve.”
“No, no! Don’t involve me in your self-loathing, rodent!”
Eggman had begun to thrash in Shadow’s grip. Shadow just ignored him, closed his eyes, and flew into the light. He heard Sonic, Rouge, and Omega call out for him from below, but he proceeded anyway.
Rouge watched with wide eyes. She fluttered her wings and sped up to the rift. “Shadow! Shadow, you in there?! Can you hear me?!”
Wind and souls rushed past her. Over the intense howling in her ears, she made out a faint sound… It was a distant, somewhat distorted voice saying, “It worked!”
Rouge’s face lit up. She turned to the others and passed on the news. “They’re through!”
Relieved smiles spread across everyone’s faces. Rouge flew through the rift with Knuckles, followed by Tails and Omega.
Sonic and Elise were last. Elise tilted her head down, staring into the darkness below. With all the souls and debris leaving this space, it now looked even emptier than before… She clasped her hands together and let out a shaky sigh. “Please be okay, boys… Please…”
“They’re alright, Elise. Just elsewhere.” Even as he spoke, Sonic’s eyes remained glued on the abyss below.
For a moment, he felt an overwhelming sense of déjà vu.
Gazing down at Earth from outer space… One golden inhibitor ring in hand… Hoping a certain hedgehog would miraculously fly back up… Waiting and waiting, until the calls of his friends led him back to the Space Colony Ark…
Sonic shook his head to discard those memories. “They’re alright.”
“They deserved better. I didn’t know either of them very well, but I do know that.”
Small, sparkling beads fell into the darkness. They twinkled briefly before disappearing. Sonic’s eyes widened, and he turned to find Elise crying silently in his arms.
“Elise, I…”
She sniffed and wiped her eyes. “Let’s not keep the others waiting. Go.”
Sonic pursed his lips and nodded. He heard the distorted voices of his friends calling for him and went to join them.
Waiting and waiting, until the calls of his friends led him back to the Space Colony Ark.
Tails, Knuckles, and Rouge rejoiced upon seeing Sonic and Elise appear from thin air. Sonic carefully set Elise on the ground as she wiped away her tears and put on a smile. But, admittedly, it wasn’t too difficult for her to don a grin now.
She was back in Soleanna.
Elise watched in awe as, brick by brick, the kingdom reassembled. Buildings reformed from dust, her distant castle could be seen rising from the ground, and the streets around them filled with people as more souls returned to reality. Joyous cheers flooded the streets.
Sonic rested his hands on his hips and gazed at the people around them. A smile tugged at his lips, and, after a bit of struggle, finally managed to light up his face. The somberness of his expression faded away.
After what was probably the closest call Sonic had ever faced, the world was saved once more.
With a contented nod of his head, Sonic closed his eyes. His body flashed bright gold. The brilliant yellow sheen across his fur slipped away. Sonic’s quills slumped back down, and when he reopened his eyes, they were green.
Shadow watched this happen from the corner of his eye. Yeah, their Super forms probably weren’t needed anymore.
Just to be sure, Shadow scanned the crowd. He saw only happy faces and heard only delighted cries. Tails was tackling Sonic into a hug, Elise greeted her people, and Knuckles was no longer tense… Everyone else was at ease now. Satisfied with the state of things (and knowing he couldn’t change what he wasn’t satisfied with), Shadow released his Super form as well. The pale, almost white glow faded away… and the Chaos Emeralds appeared around him. They circled briefly, just long enough for everyone to see, before shooting into the sky and scattering.
Shadow scowled and muttered, “Sonic. If the emeralds have left… Doesn’t that mean Silver shifted out of his Super form at some point before us?”
Sonic looked up from Tails embracing him. He let the fox continue to squeeze him with all his might, even though it did make replying difficult. “Shoot… I didn’t think of that. Yeah, you’re right.”
“He is no longer invincible.”
“Maybe he doesn’t need to be.”
Shadow lowered his head. That was an… acceptable answer.
Among all the surrounding celebrations, one voice called out to Shadow. “Hey, handsome,” Rouge said, strolling up to him. In one hand was her open flip phone. “GUN just called me to thank Omega and I for our wonderful services. Now they want to talk to you.”
“Is it about what I did with the doctor?”
“It’s totally about what you did with the doctor.”
“Damn.”
Rouge offered her phone to Shadow. Her expression was sympathetic… even if she supposed he probably deserved some kind of punishment for his betrayal.
Shadow ignored her soft pity and snatched the phone from her. He slunk through the crowd and into an alleyway, where there was less noise. After clearing his throat, he raised the phone to his ear. “Greetings, Commander…”
The gruff voice of a man came from the other end of the call. “Are you aware of why we’re calling you?”
“Certainly. And I would like to apologize, whether or not it means anything.” Shadow rocked on his heels. From the corner of his eye, he saw Rouge watching from afar. As soon as they made eye contact, she turned away and let him be.
“We’re already giving you and your team the most freedom out of all agents. Straying from the mission is one thing, but to actively form an alliance with Dr. Eggman? A terrorist and war criminal? Our top enemy? What were you thinking?”
“I thought his machines could be useful for capturing Mephiles-”
“If you knew you weren’t capable of doing that alone, you could’ve called us for backup!”
“It wouldn’t have been the same!” Shadow began to pace the alleyway. “I needed the doctor’s time machine to show Silver the truth!”
“Who?”
Shadow slumped against a wall. “Silver was a… a kid. Under Mephiles’ control. I thought I knew what was best for him.”
A heavy sigh came from the other end of the phone. There was a pause, and Shadow could practically picture the Commander with his head in his hands. “Listen, Shadow. I… Okay. You had good intentions and executed them horribly-” Shadow grimaced. “-I can at least wrap my head around that. When Rouge told me of what you’d been up to, I feared that you had abandoned GUN for good.”
“No, certainly not. It was a temporary alliance with the doctor, and it’s over.”
“Good. But you’ve betrayed the trust of this organization, and a punishment is still in order.”
Speaking of Dr. Eggman… he was currently trying to slink away from the others. He limped through the crowd, partially crouching so that his height wouldn’t give him away. Unfortunately for him, Omega’s scanners found him before he could get far. “EGGMAN,” the robot said, “WHAT MAKES YOU THINK YOU CAN WALK AWAY IN A NON-BULLET-RIDDEN STATE?”
Omega’s loud voice caught the attention of Elise. She saw Eggman freeze up as Omega called out to him. The princess clapped her hands. “Guards! Arrest that man at once!”
Eggman gave up on trying to be sneaky. He stood upright and ran as best as he could. The handful of nearby guards gave chase, weapons drawn as they closed in around him. People continued to appear from thin air, making it difficult for both Eggman and the guards to navigate the crowds.
The pursuit came to a grinding halt when a gunshot echoed through the street. Civilians screamed and ducked. Eggman felt something burning on his arm. The doctor hissed in pain and clutched his shoulder to find a shallow bullet wound there. It had grazed his skin but only bled a little.
“OOPS. I MISSED.” Omega took aim with his arm gun once again.
Rouge grabbed Omega’s raised arm and tried to pull it down. “Easy there, big man! It’s much too crowded here for such brutish behavior. You don’t want to accidentally put a hole in some poor civilian, do you?”
“I WOULD NOT MIND.”
“Well I would!” Elise exclaimed, also trying to discourage him. No matter how much she and Rouge pulled on his arm, the robot didn’t budge. “Please, hasn’t there been enough chaos for one day?”
“NOPE.” Omega returned his focus to Eggman, only to find that the guards had already caught him. They couldn’t put handcuffs on him while his arm was in a sling, so they simply pinned his non-broken arm behind his back. Eggman couldn’t put up much of a fight anyway.
Of the vehicles parked along the street, one was a guard’s patrol van. The back swung open, and the guards brought Eggman inside. He cursed to himself along the way.
Omega finally lowered his weapon. The kill wasn’t worth it without a chaotic chase or battle… “A SHAME. I WILL JUST WAIT FOR HIM TO BREAK FREE.”
Elise sighed. “He won’t break out-”
Sonic laughed at that. “Nah, he totally will. I give it two weeks, tops!”
Beside him, Knuckles rolled his eyes. “What hopeful thinking… Couldn’t you at least say three weeks? Don’t you want a break from his schemes?”
“I’m just being realistic here…”
“He’s not breaking out!” Elise snapped. “I’ll make sure of it.”
Sonic just shrugged. “Two weeks.”
Tails sighed. “C’mon, Sonic… Knuckles is right, we all need a break.” His mind flashed back to the timeless pocket of space they had all just escaped from… and Sonic’s corpse, slumped in his own lap…
Sonic could see the fox’s face begin to shift. He pulled him into another hug to snap him out of those thoughts. “Alright, fine… I guess with Eggman’s arm being broken… maybe it will be more than two weeks.”
Knuckles gave an approving nod. “That’s the spirit-”
“Fifteen days.”
He punched Sonic’s arm. “You!”
Grinning, Sonic grabbed Knuckles and yanked him into the hug as well.
As the crowd relaxed and returned to their celebrations, Shadow emerged from the alleyway. He flipped Rouge’s phone shut and tried to find her amongst the people. That wasn’t hard to do, at least, since she stood beside Omega’s hulking figure.
Rouge cocked an eyebrow when she saw Shadow approaching. “So? How’d it go?”
Shadow returned her phone. “I’m not allowed on any major missions until I regain the Commander’s trust. In the meantime, I’ll be assigned pointless busywork. Small jobs and nothing more… probably ones that don’t involve the doctor.”
“Hm. That’s not so bad.”
“No, it isn’t. I thanked the Commander.”
“I bet it bruised your poor ego though, hm?”
Shadow’s ear flicked to the side in annoyance. “I’m fine.”
Rouge decided not to pester him any further. He appeared more tired than usual. Now wasn’t the time, not after everything they had just gone through.
Shadow crossed his arms, though his posture remained slackened. There was no need to be uptight now. Everything was… resolved. Not perfectly. But resolved nonetheless. It was hard to keep a grumpy face when he was surrounded by such positivity. Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles were laughing with each other. Omega kept a keen eye on the guards’ van as they hauled Eggman away, down the street to the distant castle. Elise was watching it, too, but her attention was soon diverted to all the eager civilians begging to know what had happened. She told them about Solaris, but she kept her tale upbeat and focused on the action. Even when mentioning Silver, her smile didn’t falter.
Shadow inhaled deeply, savoring the salty sea air in his nose and lungs. He turned his eyes to the sky. Nearly all the clouds had vanished, and now the warm rays from the sun directly above soaked into his fur.
If only Silver could enjoy this, too.
And… maybe even Mephiles. A peaceful day might do him some good.
This felt like the ideal time to make amends. After the battle, when everyone was settling and tensions fell… Shadow should’ve been apologizing to Silver right now. He should’ve been trying to reach a truce with Mephiles, too, if that would make Silver feel better.
He should’ve…!
Shadow took in another breath of that fresh ocean air.
They will come back, or I will find them.
But until then… at least it was a beautiful day on Earth.
Silly Shadow doodle... Surely he won't regret that!