Chapter Text
He had heard stories.
Incredible stories about people whose personalities were influenced upon receiving someone’s heart.
How a young girl, upon receiving a heart transplant from a departed young ballerino - took a profound love for dancing - even though she had never danced a day in her life. How another boy, upon receiving his new heart, grew to deeply love a group of children he kept seeing vividly in his dreams despite having never met them. How a dangerous man’s demeanor changed from a life of crime to saving lives upon receiving the heart of a gentle soul..
Each story, each report he read was more fascinating than the last; Professor Gerald had his own theories on how such a phenomenon could occur, but he would only be able to prove it through application.
And what a dangerous, unprecedented application this would be.
The more you learn, the less you know. Those were his dear father’s words to him when he was just a little boy. How true they were.
Because only a fool would think of the world merely in terms of the material. The Unseen, as he liked to refer to it, was as intriguing as the wonders of the Physical, if not more so. The endless possibilities of Chaos energy, how it responds to the heart and soul, all the other intangible forms of energy that exist in the universe…even if he lived a thousand years, he wouldn’t be able to learn everything.
He knew - he knew no reasonable man would ever make a deal with the likes of Black Doom; he was toying with the fundamentals of life itself. His bargain with the vicious alien warlord was a Faustian one…a wiser man would’ve never agreed to anything the demon proposed in way of a ‘deal’, much less create a being carrying his blood.
But Gerald’s rationality tended to fly out the window wherever it concerned his dear granddaughter.
He’d run out of options; tried every other solution he could think of - applied his genius in every possible way, nothing worked.
Experiment after experiment, up until the Biolizard. His last resort.
The Biolizard, despite its promising early projections of success, was a tragic failure. A failure he still couldn’t bring himself to show his gentle-hearted Maria. The sad state of the creature would give her nightmares.
He had no other options after that, no viable paths he could take down the road of treating Maria’s worsening condition. And to add to it all, the government was cutting his funding unless he ‘pulls his head out of that nonsense’ and starts building the weapon the President lusted for.
And just like with Black Doom, he knew better than to engage them, but desperate men do desperate things.
Truth be told, there was no way for him to know how the Black Arms DNA could influence the creature, especially once it reached fully physical maturity. He could only predict based on theories and lessons learned from the Biolizard, but all of that would mean nothing when it comes to the creature’s psyche, its personality. Its…soul.
That was a matter of the Unseen he could never control.
Gerald stood at the pod, observing the growing fetus. The most disturbing of the Black Larva’s physical attributes were finally gone, and the creature was developing into a more familiar, normal shape, not too different to how every creature on Earth starts off. By the time it would be ready to come out, Gerald prayed it would look how he engineered it to be.
If it did, Maria would be over the moon with the surprise he had in store for her.
The Professor pulled the biological scanner over, extending the joint of the long arm it was attached to so the screen was positioned exactly over the fetus’s body. Equations began to scroll along the edges like an unsettling version of a film’s credit sequence.
Framed in the center of it all, the organ that would eventually develop to become the creature’s heart pulsed.
It sat exactly where it should be behind the rib cage, but it was still tiny and uncoordinated, a ways away from beating like a normal heart. The fetus was still too delicate to take out of its controlled environment, so Gerald would have to do the operation through the IV line going into the pod.
He turned back to the workstation, and looked with an eagle’s eye into the microscope. Needle in hand, he meticulously picked some stem cells from the miniscule tissue of muscle in the dish and walked back to the pod. He entered his code, and the IV line was active and ready.
Only dimly registering the slight shaking of his hands, Gerald transplanted some of Maria’s heart cells into the creature’s own.
oOoOoOoOoOo
“It’s.. a hedgehog?! Oh my gosh oh my gosh it’s a hedgehog-! ”
Gerald rushed to steady Maria’s shoulders when she looked about to swoon mid-bounce. “Yes, yes, my dear, but please calm down! I knew you’d be delighte-”
“Is it a boy or a girl?!” she asked breathlessly, her smile lighting her whole face, hardly bothered by the fact that she was barely able to stand upright without her grandfather’s help.
“A boy-”
“Look at his little paws - and tail! And the stripes, they’re so cool!” she went on, smooshing her face against the glass, trying to observe the still-forming hoglet more closely, and Gerald could practically see the gleam of Robotnik genius shine through her eyes.
Maria’s illness stopped her from many things, but it didn’t in any way diminish her awakening genius, especially in the natural sciences. If - no, when he finds the cure, he knew Maria would go on to become a legend in her field one day.
She had a knack for robotics, like her grandfather and uncle, but it was the marvel of organic creation that captured her completely. Gerald knew she was going to follow every detail of this creature’s growth, and Gerald wouldn’t want it any other way.
Well, it also helped that his granddaughter absolutely loved hedgehogs.
“..and his spines are all puffed out, like a star! He’s already perfect, Grandfather! Can he come out soon? What’s his name?”
“He still barely looks like a hedgehog, love,” laughed Gerald fondly. “He’s still growing, it’ll be a while longer.”
“How big’s he gonna be?”
The genius hummed thoughtfully. “If all goes well..I think it might be possible to take him out of the pod when he’s a little under two feet.”
“That would make him about the size of a six year old,” said the girl, looking up at her grandfather curiously. Gerald nodded in agreement.
“Indeed. He won’t grow at the normal rate of hedgehogs; in fact, he’ll probably reach full physical maturity within just a few months after that..a year at most.”
“What’s his name?”
Gerald paused. “Well, he doesn’t quite have one yet, we’ve been referring to him as Shadow.”
“It’s perfect,” she breathed, turning back to gaze at the small creature curled onto itself.
Gerald was surprised. It wasn’t like the name had any affection behind it. It was grim, like the potential of this creature’s fate. In fact, the name had been lovelessly, scornfully given on a particularly difficult day.
It had been one of Maria’s particularly bad turns, her condition worsened to the point where she had had to undergo another delicate operation. Gerald had been beside himself with worry, so had been the entire staff. Through the crippling stress over Maria’s very life, having to still go in and out to check on this creature when no one even knew if it would ever be useful hadn’t been how anyone wanted to use their time; the creature’s name was a reflection of the dark place everyone’s heart was in that day.
“Perhaps a more optimistic name is in order. That’s for you to choose, my dear.”
“No, Shadow is perfect,” she insisted. “A shadow tells you which way to go to find the light.”
For a moment, Gerald was speechless. Here Maria was again, reminding him of what it meant to be a student of life. Cutting through the darkening fog and pulling him out of the well before he found himself descending it again the way it tended to happen on his worse days.
She was his legacy, his pride and joy.
He wrapped his arms around her in a hug, running a hand gently through her soft locks, hit by the sudden, inopportune desire to cry. Thankfully, he was able to hold his tears at bay. He loved her so much.
“Grandfather? Please don’t wake him up without me, okay?” she said.
“Absolutely,” he promised. He’d never intended anything else; it only made sense that the very first person Shadow sees is Maria. That’s who he was made for, after all.
When Maria’s personal caretaker, Mrs. Bead, came to pick her up for her medication, Maria was reluctant to leave, but knew she had to. She turned one more time and pressed her small palm to the pod.
“Hello, Shadow,” she said softly. “I promise, you’ll be out before you know it. I can feel it in my heart. I can’t wait to meet you..”
After Maria was gone, Gerald went back to work, meticulously engineering what was to eventually become the hoglet’s mind. But before he could get too consumed, a young scientist, Harry, who’d been silently monitoring the mineral levels in the hybrid’s body as per Gerald’s instructions, tentatively walked over.
“Professor, sir..? I couldn’t help but overhear.. is it true you intend to bring out the creature before it’s physically mature? That would be around the fifteen year-old mark for hedgehogs, not six.”
“Indeed, if his development goes without issue,” said Gerald, fingers flying across the keyboard. “This time, we have a stabilizer; the Black Arms DNA should make that possible. So far there hasn’t been a single mutation, and aside from the accelerated development, of course, the Ultimate Lifeform is growing normally as a hedgehog.”
When a few moments went by without a word, Gerald turned to look at his young subordinate. The young scientist genuinely looked afraid. Honestly, Gerald couldn’t blame him; the Biolizard was still a fresh wound.
And those few on the ARK who knew of the Black Arms involvement (a secret Gerald kept only within his closest circle) weren’t any more appeased by the fact.
“Can we really be so confident, sir? We don’t know how it’ll react upon taking it out of the pod while still immature. We’re dealing with two unknown variables now, not one-”
“A very valid point, Harry. His physical growth, we can control,” explained Gerald. “I can adjust his body to handle the strain of Chaos Energy, program his mind and speed up his intellect…but not even I can control a living being’s emotional and psychological needs. These matters..they can only be learned through living. If he is physically stable at the six-year old phase, he can be awakened.”
“..But..wouldn’t he be too young to control his innate Chaos levels idly?”
“I’ve been researching solutions for this very problem, and I may have found it,” said Gerald. “It’s still a work in progress, and Maria will be helping me. Even though her true passion lies in the natural sciences, that girl’s already showing her chops in robotics, like her dear grandfather,” he added, full of pride.
“Besides, the earlier he gets to know Maria and form a bond with her, the better. It would help that the Ultimate Lifeform and the person he’s meant to cure get along.”
oOoOoOoOoOo
Months passed, and the Ultimate Lifeform was finally awakened to the world.
Like the Biolizard before him, Shadow grew incredibly fast.
Within the first seventy two hours of existence, he was already able to communicate in simple sentences. Maria had been the first word he uttered, to her delirious joy. The second was Professor, and Gerald liked to pretend it didn’t spark a fondness in his heart, something he never expected.
Within a week, Shadow was able to give logical answers to elementary problems Gerald gave him. And ask existential questions like every child.
Within two months, he could follow instructions during his preliminary Chaos control tests. He used both the knowledge Gerald had programmed into his brain when he was still in the pod, and newly-acquired information without issue. The Inhibitor Rings, created for him to alleviate the strain of his innate Chaos energy, served their purpose excellently.
Unlike the Biolizard, however, Shadow grew stably both physically and intellectually. He was sentient. Congenial, even if solemn and quiet.
There was nothing (that Gerald could see) to raise concerns that the Black Arms in Shadow might cause problems. Gerald couldn’t even know for certain if Shadow’s temperament was genetically influenced or if that was simply the way he was. Nevertheless, when Gerald accepted Black Doom’s deal and worked on creating this being, he’d wanted a safe choice to...balance things, and hedgehogs were the perfect species for many reasons.
But creating a creature from the foul-looking larva wasn’t something people could easily forget. While some of his staff had taken a liking to Shadow, Gerald knew some others were repulsed by him. Maybe even feared him. And like any other child, Shadow could sense it. In fact, for a creature carrying the blood of a species known for its bloodthirstiness, Shadow was a delicate soul - and for that Gerald was eternally thankful.
And so he made it an utmost priority between himself and Maria to pour love into Shadow’s heart as early as possible, before any other influences corrupted his pure mind and tainted his spirit.
He’d hoped Shadow would get along with Maria, but it was so much better than that. Never in all his years had he seen such mutual friendship and trust between two beings.
They were inseparable from day one. Maria absolutely adored Shadow, and took it upon herself to teach him everything she knew. Shadow was immediately drawn to her upon his awakening, wouldn’t leave her side except when either had to be taken for tests.
Dare he say it, Gerald believed their souls may have become intertwined.
Walking into Maria’s room one night, he found the now-familiar sight of his granddaughter sitting in her bed, back propped up against the pillows. Shadow sat in her lap, and her favorite book, Creatures of Our Earth, laid open across her legs. A vanity mirror was propped up at her feet.
“ - brushing your spines from the roots outwards is the best way to clear out any tangling and remove the baby quills, to make room for your permanent ones to come out strong,” she was explaining while gently running the brush across his fur, starting at the front of the young hedgehog’s soft head and slowly rolling it back through the top spines.
Shadow absolutely loved these sessions. Gerald stifled a laugh at the drugged look on the small hedgehog’s face - eyes half-lidded, mouth slightly open but purring contently, it was obvious he wasn’t paying attention to what was being said. Maria, blissfully unaware, went on reading from her tome and pointing at the illustrations.
“Look at this, Shadow:‘Hedgehogs place great pride on the aesthetic of their spines. In fact, in some regions of the world, they’re referred to as “crowns”. Partaking in spine grooming is both a solitary and social activity in hedgehog culture, and is viewed as a sign of trust. When it comes to gender differences, it’s common for the males to have longer spines’-”
“My dear, I don’t think he’s listening,” said Gerald, taking a seat by her side.
Maria blinked, and looked down so her hair cascaded all around the hedgehog’s head. “Shadow..? Wh…are you asleep?”
Shadow came to with a snore, startling himself out of his spell. “Mmnnooo-!”
“Okay, okay - sorry I stopped, your highness!” Maria laughed, voice like bells. She kissed the hedgehog’s head and went back to brushing his fur. “We’ll take a break. It is a big book.”
“I was just talking to Miss Promen, and she’s over the moon with your biology paper,” said Gerald. “In fact, she’s so impressed she told me to ask you if you want to skip ahead to the advanced course.”
“The one on Chao and Wisps?” asked Maria eagerly, and squealed when her grandfather nodded.
“And you, Shadow,” he turned to the hedgehog. “You’ll be joining Maria and Abraham in school next month. But now it’s time for bed, both of you, and no staying up under the sheets.”
“Wait, I still haven’t taken today’s measurements!” Maria picked up her companion, who wrapped his small arms and legs around her adorably, and carried him over to the dresser where she kept her supplies. Setting him down at the measuring wall, she began noting changes on her clipboard, from his height, to the breadth of his spines, to the size of his tail. Gerald watched his creation simply exist in the moment, basking in Maria’s affections.
Shadow was coming along very well, but even after two months, he didn’t speak a lot, despite having a vocabulary far beyond other hedgehogs his age. He also often seemed to struggle to find the right words to express his innermost thoughts, but Gerald wasn’t too concerned for now - that was to be expected of a young being new to the world, even one developing as fast as Shadow was.
Indeed, school would definitely speed up the Ultimate Lifeform’s social skills, the Professor concluded; Shadow was very intelligent, but showed little interest in much outside of Maria. In fact, Maria and himself were the only two people Shadow really interacted normally with. With the others...it ranged from giving short answers to outright not responding.
It didn't help that life on the ARK was isolating. Adults could tolerate living in such a secluded environment so far removed from Earth for long periods. But a growing child…
Unlike Maria, Shadow has never known Earth. He had no frame of reference - only an abstract understanding of what life is like. Everything the hedgehog knew came from Maria and Gerald.
He saw what a garden looked like in Maria’s books, but had no idea what relaxing in one felt like. He was taught by Gerald that the sun was important to sustain life on the planet, but didn’t really comprehend the fleeting nature of life; he’d never so much as seen a blade of grass die. He’d never even met another hedgehog. It was impossible for his young mind to truly understand the vastness of the universe without experiencing it.
It did not seem fair; Gerald expected the world from Shadow, but the only world Shadow knew was Maria, Gerald, and the ARK.
In what felt like no time, the man was pulled out of his musings as Maria and Shadow got back into bed and under the blankets, looking at him expectantly. Gerald smiled and didn’t even bother to remind them that Shadow should be sleeping in his own quarters where the Project’s team could observe him. His stern head researcher, Dr. Regen, had voiced his displeasure with the Professor’s ‘cavalier’ handling of the Ultimate Lifeform over and over again.
But there were perks to being the principal scientist of your own space colony. Made in your image.
Professor Gerald Robotnik thought he earned the right to do what he wanted when it came to his own creation.
“Mrs. Bead’s gonna die when she knows I let you sleep in my bed again~,” Maria giggled to her companion, as if reading her grandfather’s thoughts. “‘Oh my goodness, Miss Maria!’” she began in an impression of her kindly-but-nervous caretaker. “You can’t use your brushes on the Ultimate Lifeform, it’s unhygienic!’ ‘Noo, Miss Maria! Don’t carry the Ultimate Lifeform, his powers are unpredictable, you could get hurt!’ ‘Miss Maria, pleeaaase - you tell him to stop hiding under your bed and making strange noises at me, he won’t listen to anything I say!”
“Hmph.” was all Shadow said, making his disinterest in the elderly woman’s opinions clear. Then he wriggled in Maria’s arms to make himself more comfortable.
“Which story shall we read tonight?”
“King Arthur,” piped up Shadow.
“King Arthur? But we just finished that one a couple days ago.”
“Again,” insisted Shadow.
“He really likes Sir Lancelot,” murmured Maria sleepily. She nuzzled Shadow’s head.
He picked up the book and began reading. Maria laid propped up on her arm, blankets up to her head, left arm wrapped around Shadow while the hedgehog began to purr again, hands wrapped around her arm and spines splayed every which way. He watched Gerald while he told the story and gave each character a different voice for dramatic effect - and only came out of his captivated state to protest if Gerald mistakenly used the wrong voice for the wrong character.
Unbidden, his own sons’ young faces flashed before his eyes - an old memory, as they eagerly waited for him to get back from the lab to read to them. He ran his hand over the sleepy Shadow’s head, giving him an affectionate stroke across the cheek.
It felt like only yesterday that he’d looked upon this creature with scorn, a reminder of the defilement of life that he’d committed when he agreed to Black Doom’s deal. But now, all he could see was a small boy who was trying to understand his place in the world.
He’d made the right choice, Gerald believed more and more with every passing day, by bringing Shadow into the world where he could experience love and internalize it.
Shadow would not be Black Doom’s soldier.
He would not be humanity’s weapon, either.
Shadow would be Shadow. And he would be a beacon of hope, a champion of life. Him and Maria, together they would change the world. And Gerald would be nothing but proud.
And when morning came, along with it came Mrs. Bead barging into Gerald’s suite as he sat with his morning coffee. “Professor-!” she cried, red-faced. “Pleeaase, you speak with Miss Maria! She let the Ultimate Lifeform sleep in her bed again! I about had a heart attack!”
Gerald hid his smile in his cup.
oOoOoOoOoOo
Another couple months passed, and Shadow’s growth remained on track with Gerald’s trajectory. Rapid - and not without some challenges, but stable.
Not a single mutation; Black Doom had not lied when he said his DNA would channel Chaos energy without issue.
With Shadow’s growth, the tests become more straining, but his astounding immunity against every pathogen injected into his bloodstream filled the research team with hope. They were even ahead of schedule, and Gerald was confident it was time to prepare for the procedure. When he created Shadow, the theory was that his blood could be used to treat Maria - the fact that he also carried some of Maria’s cells should further improve compatibility. It was a sound theory.
This was it. After years of stress and frustration and what could only be likened to trying to carve on water, they attempted the very first blood transfusion between Gerald Robotnik’s greatest creation - the Ultimate Lifeform, and Maria.
It went absolutely nowhere.
The transfusion only took a toll on the already-frail Maria, making her even weaker and bedridden afterwards. Dr. Regen and his team furiously analyzed and re-analyzed Shadow’s protein structure, blood components and cellular insulation, but nobody could figure out the problem.
They performed tests on the hedgehog for hours, sending him back and forth to his quarters for further observation, denying his requests to visit Maria in the sickbay. Some of the scientists felt terrible, seeing the mental toll all of this was taking on Shadow, and his clear loneliness, but Regen shot down every suggestion to consider the hedgehog’s psychological needs or allow him to visit his friend.
Gerald was up to his eyeballs in problems of his own. The Federation couldn’t have picked a worse time to begin sniffing around for their promised weapon.
Wanton war dogs, Gerald thought with revolt, sitting at the screen in the ARK’s Communication Chamber - the last place he wanted to be while his granddaughter was bedridden - barely hiding his contempt as he talked with yet another of the President’s cabinet members. He felt no qualms seeing people like them as beneath him, and felt no guilt lying.
It didn’t make it any more bearable that this cabinet lackey actually had more than two brain cells.
“..Professor,” God, even the man’s cadence sounded slimy in Gerald’s ears. “Over the course of five years, you’ve received what amounts to a small country’s GDP in funding. And you’re trying to convince me you haven’t created a single viable weapon? Not one? With a mind like yours? And a team of the brightest minds on the planet?”
“As I already explained, Project Shadow was a catastrophic failure,” gritted Gerald. “The salamander we used grew exponentially to the point where its organs were failing under its own weight.”
“Yes, yes, you made that point,” said the man dismissively. “What happened after that?”
“Regrettably, we had to euthanize it,” lied Gerald. I’ll need a whole other goddamn log to keep all these fabrications straight, he thought to himself irritably.
“No, obviously,” said the man. “I meant what’s become of the next animal for the project? ”
“We’re still researching a suitable candidate.”
“..I see. I’ll have you know, there is considerable talk of freezing Project Shadow entirely. It’s probably for the best but nevertheless - if it were to continue for the foreseeable future, what species are you considering? ”
“Undetermined.” Throw them off Shadow’s scent. Gerald didn’t want these dogs within the planet’s radius of Shadow. Not when he was still so young and pure-minded. “Like I said, we’re still considering our options.”
“You mean to tell me that there’s been nothing since the prototype for the past fifteen months?” said the man nasally, his disbelief blatantly obvious. “I find that very hard to believe, Professor. Maybe from a lesser man, but not the Gerald Robotnik.”
“Just because this project is behind schedule doesn’t mean I’m not honoring my end of the agreement,” said Gerald, thinking fast. It felt like he was building a castle of cards. “I’m making progress in another project, grander than Project Shadow. This will be the ultimate weapon - with it the United Federation would rule the planet. Inform the President that progress on the Eclipse Cannon is going well.”
Throw them off Shadow’s scent.
The man still looked skeptical, but with people like him, greed always overtakes. “I know nothing of this project. In what w-”
“On second thought - due to the highly-sensitive nature of the information surrounding it, I will speak directly to the President,” said Gerald shortly, getting up. “Now excuse me, I must return to my team immediately. Good evening, Mr. Barlowe.”
He didn’t wait for the man to respond, and terminated the call, swearing profusely. Barlowe wasn’t a complete numbskull, unlike his predecessors, but Gerald’s patience was wearing thin and if the call had gone any longer, he would’ve said something he could regret. Bringing up the Cannon at all was already a very risky move.
Irrational. He wasn’t normally like this.
Throw them off Shadow’s scent.
The more Barlowe tried to bring the conversation (no, interrogation) back to Shadow, the shorter Gerald’s fuse went. The idea of Shadow being a tool under anyone’s control was becoming repulsive, unacceptable. He wasn’t gonna let it happen. Shadow may be a marvelous creation to the research team, but to Gerald, Shadow was also a part of him.
Well , well…who’d have thought.. He thought to himself, suppressing a rueful laugh. This ended up happening faster than I thought.
He rushed to the sickbay, and to his immense relief, Maria was already sitting upright in the bed. A tray of food sat untouched in her lap. Mrs. Bead sat by her side, fork in hand, begging the girl to take a bite. The moment he saw her, the stress was temporarily banished to a corner, and he rushed to her side for an embrace.
“Grandfather! Thank goodness! What’s going on, is everything alright?!”
“Of course, dear, all’s well. I had to appease a group of f…politicians. They can be quite dangerous to talk to,” he said dismissively, running a hand through her hair affectionately. “I’m sorry I couldn’t come earlier. How are you feeling now?”
“But…if Shadow’s not with you, where is he?” she asked urgently. “Mrs. Bead’s saying they've been running tests on him ever since I was here but it’s been a whole day! What’re they doing till now?”
Gerald was surprised. “He’s still in the lab?”
“I need to see him. He must be so upset.”
“I’ll go see what’s going on. You settle down and eat.”
“Uh-uh.. I don’t feel like putting anything in my mouth. My stomach’s very unsettled,” said Maria, leaning her head back against the propped pillows.
“Oh love, it must be the aftermath of the transfusion,” began Mrs. Bead in a kind voice. “It’s alright, the research team are doing their best to understand what’s wrong with the Ultimate Li- ”
Maria shook her head, face pinched. “There’s nothing wrong with Shadow, Mrs. Bead -” she began, then paused, eyes growing anxious. She quickly turned back to her grandfather. “Grandfather-! What if Dr. Regen’s giving him a hard time?”
“Now, my dear,” said Gerald reassuringly. “I know Dr. Regen’s..tenacity can be exhausting, but he’s a brilliant man and knows what he’s doing. Nevertheless, I’m going down there right now to make sure everything’s going well.”
“He doesn’t treat Shadow fair,” insisted Maria. “He doesn’t think he needs to rest, or eat, or play or just hang out with me like a normal kid! And Dr. Tower - Dr. Tower doesn’t like him, and Abe doesn’t like him because his dad doesn’t! It’s not fair. They’re keeping him away, I know they are.”
“You rest,” said Gerald again, standing up. “I’ll go fetch him.”
Truth be told, he’d definitely expected to see Shadow with Maria. The fact that he wasn’t there was completely out of character. Concerned, he sped up his pace, making for the elevators that connect to the southwest wing of the ARK.
The doors slid open and he strode down the long, calmly-lit, quiet main hallway. It was getting late, and not a whole lot of the colony’s staff were out. And even though he was on the other side of the Earth’s view, he could still see the faint glimmering of the Aurora Borealis out the corner of his eyes peeking from the farthest windows.
He finally reached the lab’s doors - and immediately sensed the energy the moment they slid open and he walked in.
“Professor-! Thank goodness!” said Regen over a backdrop of the team’s relieved exclamations. “I’ve about had it with the Ultimate Lifeform - he’s being uncooperative!”
“What happened?” Gerald didn’t know if he was intrigued, or worried. “Where is he?”
“In his quarters. We practically had to drag him in.”
“We aren’t finished with the procedures, but he stopped responding to any instructions-” one other scientist began to explain.
“That’s not even the real issue here!” an angry voice came from behind him, and Gerald turned to see Dr. Tower storm towards him. “Professor, what happened can’t be ignored - we are on the cusp of a security hazard and we must neutralize it before it becomes too dangerous to control!”
“Whatever are you talking about…?” sighed Gerald, feeling a headache coming on.
“He nearly attacked me!”
“…But, he didn’t?”
“It’s - no that’s not the point! The fact that he considered it is the problem!”
Gerald remained stoic. What he was hearing was very concerning but it sounded nothing like the hedgehog. Shadow had massive strength due to the Chaos energy stored in his cells, and...it technically wasn’t an impossibility for a being with all this stored power to become irritable and aggressive over time even with the Black Arms DNA as a stabilizer but…Shadow’s temperament remained quite tender. “What provoked this? Shadow wouldn’t attack for no reason.”
“Professor,” a softer voice spoke up, it was one of the younger interns. “He was getting more and more stressed over Miss Maria’s condition. He wanted to see her but wasn’t allowed until we could figure out why the transfusion failed. But we’re no closer to learning anything than we were this morning.”
“..You’ve been running tests on him since then without reprieve?” said Gerald abruptly, an edge seeping into his voice despite his calm exterior. “Not even letting him have the comfort of knowing that Maria is alright?”
“I..” said the scientist nervously. “I did..propose the idea to Dr. Regen, but-”
“I declined because it’s a preposterous waste of time,” said Regen tersely. “ You hired me to give you results, Professor, and that’s what I intend to do. The priority right now is to find the problem so we can cure your granddaughter. That’s the most important thing, that’s the whole point of this being’s existence! What changed?”
“He’s a confused child who may be thinking it’s his fault Maria is bedridden because that’s how everyone’s been handling the situation from where I stand,” said Gerald, coldly. The younger researchers especially seemed to shrink back in embarrassment. Some looked mortified, even close to tears to be in a position where the genius they idolized looked down on them.
“That is no excuse to go against my orders,” said Regen. “And definitely no excuse to intimidate any member of the staff who literally brought him into the world.”
“Let me view the tapes.”
They played the footage, skipping many hours ahead to when an exhausted, clearly-upset Shadow began to not comply. He ignored orders, walked away from flustered interns, and even stood up to Tower, motioning towards the door leading out into the hallway and even taking a step towards it. Tower, done with the hedgehog’s stubbornness, grabbed him by the arm to pull him back - and strands of yellow Chaos energy crackled along Shadow’s quills as his spines flared out.
The man blanched, and pulled back like he was burned, cradling his injured hand in the other. His mouth moved angrily, shouting and motioning at the hedgehog wildly. The other scientists began to move in closer, and Shadow was backed up against the wall, trying to keep everyone in his range of sight, ears back, eyes large, nose flared-
“..It seems to me, Dr. Tower, you alarmed him,” said Gerald, voice deceptively calm. “He only reacted reflexively, exactly like a young hedgehog would.”
“But then he bared his teeth and hissed at me! Look!”
“Another completely normal reaction for an overwhelmed young hedgehog. I can’t believe I have to explain this to you, Doctor. Even young Abraham learned this in school.”
The man’s face turned an abashed red. “It - we had to force him into his quarters, Professor..! Please don’t make light of this - the footage doesn’t do justice to how terrifying it was!”
“..He’s growing, Professor, and with it his strength,” spoke Regen, trying to bring some calm back to the room. “The truth of the matter is, none of us know how his…blood will inform his behaviour in the future. Today, it was a gash. Tomorrow, it could be someone’s life.
“The fact that he’s beginning to show this.. aggressive - this..insubordinate behaviour means we must handle him much more strictly from now on. I strongly advise that he be kept in his quarters when not in testing, and not be allowed free movement on the ARK, and definitely nowhere near Miss Maria.”
This was a tricky position. He wasn’t gonna lie to himself, Gerald was not only relieved, but proud that Shadow showed some rebellion; in a grim world where everyone wanted to use him, he needed to be able to stand his ground and fight back, to have wants and desires of his own, to say no.
This reaction - it was all his own pure instinct, too; Gerald had not taught Shadow that. He felt an intense surge of affection for the hedgehog.
“That wouldn’t be necessary,” said Gerald finally. “It falls on myself and Maria to raise and educate Shadow. Yes, he’s growing very fast and that could lead to some unexpected behaviour. I’ll speak to him about this, make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
At the silence that ensued, Gerald calmly turned to look at Tower, who was staring open-mouthed at the head scientist. “That’s it?” he said incredulously. “You’ll give him a talk?”
“Yes, he’s very receptive to me. And I don’t believe in psychological punishment for children,” was Gerald’s backhanded comment. He could see one of the new young scientists he liked - Harry - hide his face behind a clipboard.
“Professor, please think about this,” sighed Regen, rubbing his head as if staving off a headache of his own. “We can’t treat the Ultimate Lifeform as a regular child. He is not-”
“I believe the man who’s actually raising him knows what he is,” said Gerald, voice clipped. “Unless there’s anything else you’d like to report, I’m taking Shadow for the remainder of the night.”
Regen, having known the man for over two decades, hesitated, then gave a stiff, unhappy nod. He wisely remained silent. For all his aloof tenacity, Regen could read the genius very well.
The Professor was quite calm most of the time, but those who’ve worked with Gerald Robotnik closely knew he had a fiery temper.
And his fury…well, his fury was something else entirely. Regen knew that very well.
Tower didn’t.
“It’s not a child-!” snapped Tower. “That’s what it looks like on the outside so it’s not completely repulsive to everyone working with it! Why are you defending this abomination, sir?!”
The rational thing would’ve been to explain to the frazzled scientist why this was factually incorrect. The man was scared, after all, for himself and his team. They were handling a deceptively innocent-looking being with Chaos powers. It was completely understandable, there was no reason to feel any sort of way on the matter.
But Gerald Robotnik slowly turned his head towards Tower, and even though his eyes were completely concealed behind black glasses, Tower could feel his veins shrivel and his blood turn to ice.
“What did you call him?” Gerald asked, smiling frozenly, voice no higher than a whisper.
“What Patrick’s trying to say-!” swooped in Regen, sensing the rare but terrifying Robotnik Crazy rear its head. “- is that we’ll make serious considerations for the Ultimate Lifeform’s growth and behavioral changes that come with it from now on. We’ll work with him the way you see fit, Professor.”
Gerald brushed past the both of them and the rest of the wide-eyed researchers (happy with tonight’s free entertainment, kids? thought Gerald grimly) and stopped in front of the device hung on the wall on the other side of the lab to scan his palm. The door to Shadow’s quarters slid open.
Gerald hated embarrassing colleagues - they’re all dignified men and women dedicating their life to science, after all. He always made it a point to avoid overriding other senior colleagues’ orders so brassily, as well, especially in front of young hires and interns. Yes, he knew he couldn’t control how people felt about Shadow, but he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t pissed off to the point he didn’t give a shit.
Damn, he really liked Dr. Tower, too. How disappointing.
Any passing thought of making an apology to his colleagues flew out the window when he saw Shadow sitting on his small bed, with his knees to his chest, head nested in his arms, shaking, trying to hold in frustrated tears.
For a moment, Gerald was so angry the enraged voice in his head told him to go out and rip Regen and his team a new one. The more rational side - the side that raised two boys in the past, said screw them go to the child.
“Shadow.” he gently sat down next to the hedgehog, who lifted his head to look at him, startled.
“Professor..! The Doctors said - that I’m - Maria -”
“Everything’s alright, my boy. Maria’s going to be fine. She’s been asking for you and misses you.”
The young hedgehog’s entire body loosened, he looked up at him with so much desperate relief it nearly broke the man’s heart. Incredible what a few kind words could do.
Like a kid who’s been waiting alone on the side of the road for his parent to finally arrive, Shadow propped himself up against Gerald’s thigh so his face was only an inch away. Gerald could see tiny teardrops still stuck to his lashes. “Did I do it wrong..? I did everything I was told but Maria’s still sick...are you disappointed?”
“In you? Absolutely not. You did everything right.”
Shadow’s brow furrowed, and seemed to struggle to find the words. Gerald stroked his head, silently encouraging him to speak. “We can’t - we can’t go to Earth until I cure her,” said Shadow. “..I don’t understand..I did all the tests Doctor Regen wanted but everyone just got angrier and angrier..especially Doctor Tower. And I was angry too, and I didn’t wanna do any tests anymore. Then…he grabbed my arm and…my spines did the thing Maria showed me in the book.”
“You were startled, and it was an accident. No one was hurt.”
“They said it’s not working because my blood is wrong. But you can fix it, right Professor? Can you fix my blood so the transfusion works next time?”
Gerald held the hedgehog’s chin so he was looking him dead in the eye. “No, Shadow,” said Gerald firmly. “The transfusion didn’t work because our research is still incomplete. It has nothing to do with you. Do you understand?”
Waiting patiently for the young hedgehog to process his words, he added: “You and Maria are more compatible than you know. When I created you, I intentionally made it so. And when Maria’s cured and we all return to Earth, you two will do incredible things together.”
“..But I’m not like Maria,” said Shadow, looking away. “Or you. And..I’m not..I’m not from Earth.”
“Perhaps you weren’t born on Earth like Maria and me, but you belong there just as much,” said Gerald. “You are my son, Shadow. You’re a part of us, and even though living on Earth is different from living on the ARK, you’re more than capable of it. And no matter what trouble you face, me and Maria will always be there for you. We love you.”
Shadow seemed to not know what to say, and instead, curled up into Gerald’s side as if trying to hide from the idea of that alien blue planet below everybody kept talking about.
“Can we go see Maria now?” he pleaded after a few moments, small voice shaking.
“Yes. I’m sorry it took me so long to come get you,” he said gently, taking the hedgehog’s hand. “Off we go.”
As expected, no one dared speak a word to Gerald as he walked out with the Ultimate Lifeform. He had to hand it to Dr. Regen, the man understood him well enough to warn everyone in the lab that if they so much as look Shadow’s way right now they’d probably all be fired. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Tower hunched over the desk working on something - probably some task Regen gave him to get him out of Gerald’s way.
When they finally got back to the sickbay, Shadow let go of Gerald’s hand and ran up to Maria’s bed, who threw her arms around him, and he practically melted in her embrace. Gerald took the seat by them, and gently pulled Maria - and Shadow still tightly held in her arms - to rest against his chest in a hug. He held their small, warm hands in his own.
Even though this transfusion attempt was a failure, they would learn from it. The next time would be a success, he was sure of it.
But he was wrong.
- To be continued -