Chapter Text
Shadow’s body slams hard into stone.
Omega’s claw clamps around his torso, sharp points digging into flesh as the robot crushes him against the crumbling wall of the building. Omega’s ocular lenses burn an eerie red - blank and unfeeling, like the blood gathering in the cracks of the asphalt below.
Shadow can’t draw a full breath. Most of his ribs are broken; he can feel them grinding, threatening his lungs as Omega tightens his grip. He tastes copper.
He summons a chaos spear in one trembling hand and drives it into Omega’s elbow joint. The robot doesn’t flinch, but something crackles and screams as the energy fries his wiring. The pressure eases - just enough.
(Silently, distantly, Shadow promises himself he’ll fix the damage later..)
He twists free and drops to the dusty ground with a hoarse grunt. He barely manages to get his feet under him before a spinning blur of blue crashes into his side, sending him skidding across the rough asphalt.
His lungs burn. White-hot pain tears through his left arm. When he reaches up with shaking fingers, he feels bone jutting through blood-slick black fur.
Dust settles. When he forces his eyes open, all he sees are red shoes.
“Stay down, Shadow,” Sonic says softly. “G.U.N. is on their way.”
Shadow drags himself onto his knees, eyes wide as he looks up at Sonic. His ears pin flat; his quills flare, filthy and bristling.
“…I didn’t do it,” he chokes, something hot sliding down his chin. “Sonic. You have to believe me.”
Sonic just looks at him, his face smoothed into a neutral mask Shadow doesn’t recognize.
“Why would I hurt Rouge?” Shadow presses, his voice splintering as the words finally break through. “I- I love her, too.”
Beside Sonic, Omega’s processors whir as he refocuses his oculars on his former teammate.
“Video evidence confirms that Shadow the Hedgehog terminated Rouge the Bat within their shared residential unit, subsequently utilizing an axe to assist in post-mortem body disposal.” Omega states
The words land with mechanical precision.
Shadow’s breath hitches, and he grits his teeth, shaking his head.
“No… It’s been doctored somehow, I would never-”
“You probably just don’t remember,” Sonic cuts in, his voice almost gentle. “Your memory’s been unreliable before.”
“She’s not-”
“We saw the blood, Shadow.”
Something hot and feral ignites in Shadow’s chest. In a flash, he forces himself upright.
Sonic is faster. He’s always been faster.
One spindash is all it takes to drive Shadow back to the ground. This time, he doesn’t get back up.
A black van emblazoned with the G.U.N. insignia screeches to a halt at the edge of the square. Soldiers pour out, armored head to toe, weapons snapping up as they fan out around Shadow.
He bares his bloodied fangs at them, a silent snarl.
“Got the cuffs?” Sonic asks. One of the soldiers nods, offering a pair of thick metal restraints. Sonic takes them without comment.
Shadow stares as Sonic approaches again. Every nerve in his body screams at him to fight - to argue, to do something. To make them see the mistake they’re making. That Rouge is fine. That he didn’t-
He wouldn’t.
Sonic crouches in front of him.
Shadow goes rigid. His eyes flash in warning; his quills bristle as his breath turns ragged and wet in his throat, his battered chest jerking with each shallow gasp.
Sonic just watches him.
Up close, Shadow can see the shine in Sonic’s emerald eyes. Not anger. Not hatred. Something worse - carefully contained grief. His expression stays composed, almost kind.
“Sonic-” Shadow whispers. The sound is thin.
“It’s okay,” Sonic murmurs, light and gentle in a way that doesn’t match the moment. He reaches out and cups Shadow’s cheek.
Shadow lets him.
Sonic leans down and presses a soft, lingering kiss to Shadow’s lips. His breath is warm against blood- and sweat-matted fur. For a heartbeat, Shadow feels his body sag, the fight draining out of him like poison drawn from a wound.
The cuff clicks shut around his wrist.
The sound is sharp. Final.
Shadow doesn’t look up as Sonic withdraws his hand and stands. He doesn’t resist when the soldiers swarm him, rough and efficient, jostling his shattered arm as they haul him toward the van.
He doesn’t make a sound.
Without a word, Sonic follows the van as it pulls away.
—
Shadow doesn’t fight when they strap him into the stasis chamber.
Sonic watches from the observation room above, perched on the edge of the console with his arms wrapped around his knees, as Shadow allows himself to be maneuvered into the glass containment tube. He’s limp as a discarded ragdoll, barely responsive - drained by blood loss, broken bones, and the chaos-suppressing cuffs locked around his wrists.
The ones Sonic put there.
Technicians move with brisk efficiency, voices low and professional, as if they’re handling volatile equipment rather than a living person. Shadow doesn’t meet anyone’s eyes. He doesn’t resist when they guide his shoulders, adjust his stance, secure the restraints that will hold him upright.
He barely seems to be there at all.
“It’s only for now,” Commander Tower says beside Sonic, his posture rigid with strain. His hands are clasped behind his back so tightly his knuckles have gone white. “Only until we determine what caused his psychological break, and how to rectify it.”
Sonic glances at the old man, then back down through the reinforced glass. He says nothing. What is there to say?
He hadn’t watched the video in its entirety.
He hadn’t needed to.
He’d seen enough to know there was no ambiguity - no room for doubt - about who the footage depicted standing in the gruesome, blood-soaked wreckage of Rouge’s and Shadow’s shared apartment.
Sonic hates the part of himself that hadn’t even been surprised.
Shadow has always been capable of terrible things. But more than that, his mind has always been his weakest point. Too many people have reached inside it before. Twisted it. Rewritten it. Broken it open and rearranged the pieces.
If something finally snapped this time…
It would have only been a matter of time.
“Did you…?” Sonic rasps. His voice catches, rougher than he expects. He clears his throat and tries again. “Did you find Rouge yet?”
“Not yet,” Tower replies flatly. “Search teams are still working the area.”
Sonic closes his eyes for a moment and thinks of his old friend. He sees Rouge’s sharp grin, hears the lilt of her teasing voice. He thinks of her endless love of glittering things, of danger, of risks worth taking. He thinks of how fiercely loyal she was - how she always came back.
He thinks of Omega.
Omega, who lost both his teammates on the same day.
And he thinks of Shadow.
When Sonic opens his eyes again, the containment chamber below has sealed shut. Warning lights pulse softly as the tube begins to fill with a thick, clear fluid. It rises slowly, creeping up Shadow’s legs, his torso.
Shadow’s chest stutters with each shallow breath. His pupils are blown wide, then shrink to tiny pinpricks as panic flickers across his face - raw and unguarded. He stares straight ahead, unfocused, as though his mind has already started to drift somewhere far away.
Somewhere safer.
Sonic’s chest tightens.
He can’t stand it.
He pushes himself off the console and turns for the exit.
“Sonic.”
He pauses, one foot already halfway toward the door, and glances back over his shoulder.
Tower meets his gaze. His expression is grave, weary.
“It’s only for now.”
Sonic narrows his eyes.
He doesn’t answer.
—
They never did find Rouge.
Tower officially called off the search two weeks after Shadow was returned to stasis. The announcement was brief, clinical. Volunteers kept looking for a while longer, combing alleyways and abandoned buildings, riverbanks and ruins, until days blurred into weeks and weeks into months.
Eventually, even they stopped.
There’s a stone bearing Rouge’s name in Central City Cemetery.
The coffin beneath it is empty.
“You could’ve at least told us where you put her,” Sonic mutters.
He’s sitting on the cold floor of the containment room, back against the glass of the observation barrier, legs drawn in close. The chamber lights hum softly above him. Somewhere beyond the walls, alarms chirp and systems cycle, the base continuing on as if nothing has been lost.
Shadow doesn’t answer. He floats serenely in the containment tube, his face relaxed in sleep. If Sonic didn’t know any better, he might think Shadow looks peaceful.
That thought makes his chest ache.
Sonic comes every week.
He talks.
He tells himself it’s for Shadow’s sake, that maybe, somehow, his rival can still hear him. That maybe there’s comfort in knowing someone still shows up. That he hasn’t been completely abandoned.
The truth is, Sonic doesn’t know where else to put the words.
“She’d be furious with Tower if she knew he put you back here,” Sonic says quietly, forcing a crooked smirk he knows Shadow can’t see. “She’d raise absolute hell.”
He pauses again, watching small bubbles rise to the surface of the chamber.
“She really loved you, you know,” he adds, softer now.
Shadow doesn’t move. He never does.
After a while, Sonic pushes himself to his feet. His joints ache more than they should. He doesn’t look back as he heads for the door.
The lights hum on.
Shadow sleeps.
—
Autumn slips into winter. Visiting gets harder after that.
Sonic doesn’t care to examine why. He doesn’t want to look too closely at the hollow carved out of his chest by the loss of Shadow - and Rouge - both at once.
Sometimes, when he dreams, he feels Shadow’s arms around him. Warm. Solid. Real. When he wakes, cold and alone, he can almost smell coffee and lavender lingering in his fur, like a memory that refuses to fade.
He only cries when no one can see.
Omega has gone off on some solo mission. Sonic almost envies him - his ability to take grief and sharpen it into something destructive, something purposeful. Omega hunts. Fights. Destroys.
Sonic slows.
He moves through his days like he’s hibernating.
He sprawls on the couch in the living room, phone balanced on his stomach, thumbing idly through old messages he doesn’t open. Egghead has been strangely quiet. No grand announcements. No world-ending schemes. Nothing.
Sonic lets the phone drop against his chest and drapes an arm over his eyes with a tired groan. His fur feels rough against his face, clumped and dull. He catches a faint, musty smell and wrinkles his nose.
(He should shower.
He doesn’t.
What’s the point?)
He scratches absently at his side and scowls at the ridge of ribs beneath his fur. He’s lost weight again.
(Tails is going to freak out.)
He hasn’t seen Amy in weeks. She’d come by at first - bright smiles, flowers, baked goods that went stale on the counter. Even she stopped eventually.
Sonic can’t blame her.
(He’s so tired.)
The door to Tails’ workshop slams open without warning.
Sonic jolts hard enough that he nearly rolls off the couch. He scrambles upright just as Tails bursts into the room, skidding on the floor and barely catching himself on the table.
“Woah, buddy,” Sonic laughs awkwardly, pulling himself upright. “Where’s the fire?”
Tails stares at him, his eyes wide and wet, ears twitching erratically as he thrusts his communicator forward with a shaking hand. His mouth opens. Closes. Panic spills out anyway.
“S-Sonic,” he stammers. “R-Rouge…”
Sonic frowns, confusion knitting his brow, and then his gaze drops to the communicator.
A familiar, tinny voice crackles through the speaker.
“Sweetheart? Are you still there?”
Sonic’s heart stops.
Cold floods his veins, sweat prickling along his spine as he stares at the device like it might explode. Slowly, carefully, he reaches out and takes it from Tails’ numb fingers.
“R-Rouge…?”
“Oh, there you are, Blue,” Rouge says, irritation mixing with relief. “I’ve been calling you for days. Shadow isn’t answering either - why the hell is my apartment boarded up?”
The room tilts.
Sonic stares straight ahead, his vision tunneling. Somewhere beside him, Tails twists his hands together, ears flicking as he listens, dread dawning with every word.
“Rouge, how… Where have…?” Sonic tries, his voice sounding distant in his ears.
“Robotnik jumped me while I was treasure-hunting one of his old bases,” Rouge replies. “Locked me down, tried to interrogate me. I barely got out.” She snorts. “Thanks for the rescue, by the way.”
The communicator slips from Sonic’s grasp and clatters to the floor.
“Sonic?” Rouge’s voice calls out.
But Sonic is already gone.
—
Sonic bursts through the doors to the observation room like a streak of lightning.
The soldier on duty lets out a startled yelp, nearly dropping his mug of coffee onto the console as Sonic stalks over to him with quick, determined steps and grabs him by the front of his jacket.
Sonic’s eyes are wide and glassy, ears pinned flat to his head as he drags the man down to eye level.
“Let him out,” he rasps.
“What? I can’t do that, I have strict orders-”
Sonic’s grip tightens. Electricity crackles faintly along his quills, his gaze burning an impossible blue.
“Let. Him. Out.”
“I need to call the Commander and-”
Sonic shoves him away. The soldier stumbles back, crashing into the console, and Sonic doesn’t spare him a glance. His breathing comes fast and uneven as he slams his fist down, metal screaming as it dents under the impact.
Alarms blare to life. Red warning lights strobe across the room.
“Open,” Sonic snarls, striking the console again. “Open, damn it!”
Tears blur his vision, hot and sudden.
The soldier scrambles for his communicator, flattening himself against the wall as he frantically calls for backup. Sonic ignores him entirely.
He launches into a spindash.
The reinforced glass of the observation chamber explodes outward as Sonic tears through it, shards raining across the concrete floor. He doesn’t slow, doesn’t hesitate - just rolls and slams straight into the stasis tube.
Once.
Twice.
On the third impact, the glass finally gives.
The tube ruptures with a deafening crack, icy containment fluid flooding the room and soaking through Sonic’s shoes as it spills across the floor. Sonic barely registers the cold. He’s already clawing at the restraints, fingers slipping and burning as he wrenches them open with raw force.
Shadow crumples into him with a broken gasp.
Sonic staggers back, sinking to his knees as he catches his rival, glass crunching beneath them. Shadow is freezing, soaked, trembling violently as Sonic wraps both arms around him and pulls him close, holding him like he might vanish again if he lets go.
Shadow wheezes, weak fingers knotting in Sonic’s fur.
“How… How long..?” he whispers. His voice is hoarse, barely there.
“Only a few months,” he sobs. “Only a few months, Shadow.”
Shadow’s body slackens against him. He exhales a long, shuddering breath, his head tipping forward to rest against Sonic’s collarbone - and then he goes still.
Sonic tightens his hold instinctively, heart hammering as he listens for breath.
They stay like that for a while.