Unlike Shadow, Amy was definitely the more chatty type. And she couldn’t stand long periods of silence. After a minute or so of wandering, Amy broke the silence to fill the air with conversation, “So what do you think Eggman has going on down here? Maybe it could be a new roboticizer system he’s trying to build. Or maybe a new kind of robot he’s testing. It could also be just an underground system to get from one place to another.”

Shadow was far less of the talkative type, he didn't think it was right to engage in long conversation while doing his work, after all he needed to remain focused, if he went too deep into conversation rather than focusing on his work it could result in him failing to notice something important, or being caught unawares by the enemy.

"I would prefer to not go into speculation on what it might be, otherwise it would be easy to form biases on how we should prepare without having any prior evidence, just speculation." He explained, glancing backwards at her as he spoke. Yet while he wasn't entirely focused on the pink hedgehog that followed him it was a distraction enough to not perceive the attack.

Shadow heard something approaching quick, he looked forward only to see Eggmans trusted metal hedgehog, metal Sonic charging at him. The mechanical life form grabbed the ultimate life form by his face and slammed his head into the ground before his head darted up to stare into Amy's eyes, leaping up he delivered a spin kick, his mechanical leg colliding hard into the side of her head.

The metal beast was just as quick as Sonic and Shadow. Amy didn’t have a chance to react. After the kick, Amy collided with the wall with a scream then stumbled.

Fortunately, she was accustomed to battles at this point. She had come a long ways since her early days. Amy recovered as quick as she could and she flicked her wrist, summoning a Piko Piko hammer into her hand. She gripped it with both hands and swung it at the metal menace.

She may be accustomed to battles but this particular metal machine of Eggman’s scared her. The tyrant’s two hundred foot robots she handled in the past didn’t scare her as much as this one. Was it because of its unsettling resemblance to her blue hero? No. It’s that speed and the sheer viciousness it possessed. It was a dangerous combination. Thank Chaos she wasn’t facing this thing alone.

“It’s a trap!” Amy cried. Was that the reason for the self-destruct? It was an attempt to lure Sonic into battling his metal counterpart?

Metal Sonic was a ruthless machine, the machine part being literal and fitting with the phrase, unlike so many others he did not show remorse, even compared to other robots like Omega and Gamma he was completely heartless.

What was more terrifying however was his mentality, he could read any enemy perfectly, which was made clear as he jumped in the air to avoid Amy's hammer swing. He then curled himself up into a ball, his body spinning at an insane speed before he sent himself hurling towards her.

Right before he could make contact however Shadow charged in and kicked Metal Sonic away, who then landed a few meters away from the two hedgehogs. Shadow stood between the robotic maniac and his pink companion, his guard up and ready to fight. "You should go Rose, I'll handle this." Shadow stated, his voice stern and blunt.

"Scanning, Amy Rose, companion of Sonic the hedgehog, threat level: moderate, elimination beneficial. Shadow the hedgehog, ultimate life form, threat level: absolute, elimination necessary." Metal Sonic stated in his monotone robotic voice.

“What? And just ditch you? That’s not how I roll!” Yeah, she totally made a hedgehog pun.

Amy gripped her hammer with both hands tightly as she prepared herself. The tight confines made some moves impossible to pull off, like hitting the ground to bounce opponents up. But that probably wouldn’t make a difference to a machine which does have the ability of flight. That was ok. The hammer was plenty useful.

As she often did in battles, Amy charged for Metal Sonic. She swung her hammer like a baseball bat when she drew close enough.

Shadow knew what Amy's approach to combat was, charge in and swing her large hammer, it was predictable but more importantly it was far too slow when facing such a fast moving fighter like Metal Sonic who was indeed faster than her. Deciding if she would fail if she charged in alone he decided to make an assist and dashed past her, he leaped over Metal Sonic and fired a chaos spear, while Metal Sonic did dodge the attack it came just in time for Amy to deliver a strong swing.

The hammer collided to the side of Metal Sonics head and sent him crashing into a wall, he shook the fallen debris off of him for a moment before choosing a tactical retreat, dashing away and deeper into the underground tunnels.

Shadow let out a low growl and without a moment of hesitation he dashed behind Amy and picked her up in a bridal position as he charged after the mechanical hedgehog.

Amy was proud of herself of being able to land a hit on Metal Sonic for once. Albeit it wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for Shadow. But hey, a victory’s a victory!

Then Metal Sonic suddenly left. Amy blinked. Odd. Usually this thing would combat to the death. She had seen it. The high aggression level wouldn’t allow the robot to simply…give up. Amy had seen Metal Sonic still keep going even after losing three of his limbs. Something wasn’t right.

She squeaked as Shadow suddenly scooped her up in his arms and chased Metal further down into the tunnels. Instinctively she threw her arms around Shadow’s neck to hang on. That was certainly a surprise! She expected him to just run off and leave her behind. Come to think of it, Amy can’t recall if Shadow ever carried her before.

His gait was certainly way different than Sonic’s. The pink hedgehog already knew this as she had witnessed his motions before. There was more twisting involved because of the skating yet it flowed smoothly. Oddly enough from her perspective it was similar to a rocking motion. She’d feel relaxed if they weren’t in a battle.

Oh right. The battle.

Amy broke from her thoughts. “Doesn’t this seem weird to you that he’s running off like this?” she asked the exotic hedgehog.

Shadows eyes glanced to Amy as she mentioned Metal Sonics peculiar behaviour, he had to admit, it was certainly odd, especially after Metal Sonic deemed the ultimate life forms destruction to be absolutely necessary, just what could he be up to.

"Agreed, he likely understood that defeating the two of us was not an option and decided that a retreat was the best course of action, the question is however... Retreating to where." He explained, his tone was steady and calculating, he wasn't going to allow himself to be phased by this kind of matter, focus would be needed to defeat this machine.

Yet once they finally reached an opening they found no sign of Eggman, they did find Metal Sonic however, he was typing something into a computer.

Shadows eyes narrowed and he charged chaos energy into his right hand, changing the way he held Amy so he held her with one hand and against his chest for balance before firing off a powerful chaos spear.

Metal Sonic dodged however, sending the blast into the computer system, suddenly the entire base began going wild with warning signals and as a chunk of rock came from above Shadow shoved Amy out of the way before it came down upon him.

Metal Sonic at this point however was gone, likely returning to his master.

“Shadow?!” She called as the boulder crashed down on the black hedgehog. Then she yelped as she darted aside to avoid another piece of debris falling. Why did that happen? Shadow was always on his a-game, fully conscious of his surroundings, and didn’t usually fall victim to things like this.

No time to think about that. He needed help! And Amy couldn’t just abandon him. That wasn’t the type of person she was.

At first she tried pushing the large object but the weight kept it from budging. Then Amy paused. “What am I doing?”

She summoned another Piko Piko Hammer. This will give her the strength she needs! Holding it with both hands, Amy swung it with her might, striking the boulder to knock it away.

As soon as the rock was knocked off of Shadow the ultimate life form leaped up into the air, there was another large chunk of earth that was about to collapse on the pink hedgehog. Before it could however Shadow kicked the collapsing rock, smashing it to pieces.

Landing back onto the ground Shadow picked up Amy once more and charged forward, his first instinct was to go after Metal Sonic and so he rushed towards the cavern Metal Sonic retreated through, only for the entrance to be blocked by mass amounts of rock. It wouldn't be wise to charge through it, he had no idea how unstable this underground base was. So he turned around and charged back the way they came, leaping out of the hole they entered through.

Landing outside once more Shadow took deep steady breaths, still holding Amy in the bridal position while looking back at the base they had come from.

It was all happening so fast, Amy’s brain couldn’t register it all. One would think with all the adventures she had with Sonic that she would speed up but nope. She just has a regular ol’ brain.

When they left the crumbling facility, pausing, Amy blinked as her brain worked on catching up. Metal left and then the place was caving in. She knocked the boulder off of Shadow then he brought her outside and-

Her green eyes slid to the black hedgehog as he continued to hold her. Not that she disliked it but it wasn’t something she was used to him doing. It wasn’t like Shadow just gave out rides to people.

“Ah… Are you ok? That was an awful big rock that fell on you.”

Shadow hadn't even noticed yet that he still had Amy in his arms, he was far too focused about what they had just been through, about what had just happened. Though as Amy spoke he regained his focus on the present. "Yes I'm fine, do not concern yourself with my well being." He assured her.

It was at that moment Shadow realised that he was still carrying her and holding her close to his chest, upon realising this he gently placed her back down before turning away from her. "We shouldn't inform the others about this, not until we have more information on what exactly going on, we cannot jump to conclusions and you are one of the only few I trust to keep that in mind, understood?" He explained, his head swirving back to look at her out of the corner of his eye. Sure he could probably also trust Rouge but he didn't want to be getting anyone else involved, not in a mission where they held zero data.

How strange. On top of the other strange occurrences that were going on today, Shadow was exhibiting odd behaviour, too. Amy wasn’t sure what to make of all this.

She listened as he gave instructions, but Amy didn’t quite agree. Her eyes widened a little as Shadow directed that what happened was to remain secret. “Really? You don’t want the others to know? I’m sure they could help.”

Not that she doubted Shadow’s wisdom, exactly. The black hedgehog had shown many times that he was intellectually above many and his hunches were usually correct. But not telling Sonic and the others about whatever happened that involved Eggman was against what she usually did.

Amy knew Shadow well enough to know that sometimes he didn’t always relay what was going on in his head. He was so mysterious. It intrigued the pink hedgehog. Just what went on in that brooding head of his? Call it curiosity, but Amy didn’t want to part ways just yet. Normally she’d go running to Sonic at this time but she wanted to know more. “Not that I’d disrespect your wishes or anything, but… Why? If we have more people helping us, I think we’d find the answers faster.”

Shadow let out a sigh, great, now he would need to break everything down for her so she could understand correctly, so with that he turned back to face Amy, crossing his arms over his chest. "Incase you've forgotten, it was Sonics own recklessness that allowed this to happen, the doctor had an ambush set up using Metal Sonic, an ambush made to catch someone who would be running in without thinking, sound like anyone we know." He explained, while he was looking down on her he didn't do it in a condescending manner, more so simply that he was just taller than her. Yet Shadow always had a certain coldness to him, one that usually made him appear to be egotistical.

"More than that, getting backup is exactly what Eggman would, so until we have a true understanding on what he is doing it's best we keep this as a small operation, one that involves minimal risk and that means minimal reckless behaviour, meaning no Sonic."

At first, Shadow’s mannerism towards Sonic’s personality irked Amy. She got ready to get on the defensive for him. As Shadow went on, that irk waned and the tension in Amy’s body went away. Let’s be honest. Even Amy had to admit that Sonic was infamous for his recklessness. She’s even gone after him about it.

If this trap was meant for Sonic, Eggman wasn’t going to hold back. He wanted Sonic gone by any means he could. Shadow was right. Bringing anyone else in would mean putting their lives in danger. Sonic would do what he does and things sometimes did get muddled because of it.

The tone in Amy’s voice shifted to a more somber one. As much as she wanted the others to join, involving them would endanger them. It would tear her up if her friends were lost. Amy nodded her head once to the black hedgehog, “All right. I won’t tell them.”

The ultimate life form gave a nod, glad to see Amy could understand his point of view on the matter, it was rare that Shadow worked with anyone anyway, when he had a mission to do he focused on the mission, he didn't need to get a group together.

"Good, in that case we should get a move on, otherwise if we are caught here it would be suspicious." He explained to her before he started walking away, glancing back to make sure Amy was following him.

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