Three weeks.
Shadic had been unconscious for three weeks.
Tails had done everything he could—medical equipment salvaged from G.U.N. facilities, Chaos Energy infusions, experimental healing tech that shouldn't have existed outside of science fiction. Every day, he ran new scans, tried new treatments, searched for any sign that his friend was recovering.
The results were always the same.
Stable, but unresponsive.
Alive, but not waking up.
Amy hadn't left his side. She slept in a chair next to his bed, ate meals brought to her by Rouge, and spent every waking moment watching the slow rise and fall of his chest. Waiting. Hoping. Praying to whatever cosmic forces might be listening.
Knuckles had returned to Angel Island, but he checked in daily via communicator. The Master Emerald was behaving strangely, he reported—pulsing with irregular energy, as if sensing something the rest of them couldn't.
Omega ran constant perimeter sweeps, his sensors extended to maximum range. "VIGILANCE IS OPTIMAL," he declared whenever anyone asked why he never stood down. "THREATS MAY EMERGE AT ANY TIME."
Rouge stayed because Rouge always stayed when her family needed her. She didn't talk about feelings—that wasn't her style—but she was THERE. Reliable. Steady.
And in the containment field at the center of Tails' workshop, surrounded by the seven Chaos Emeralds arranged in a perfect circle, Nazo's prison pulsed with dark energy.
The seal was holding.
For now.
On the twenty-second day, the cracks began to appear.
Tails noticed them first—hairline fractures in the seal's energy signature, so small they were barely detectable. He dismissed them as sensor errors, ran diagnostics, convinced himself everything was fine.
By day twenty-three, the cracks had grown.
"This isn't possible," Tails muttered, staring at his displays with growing horror. "The seal should be permanent. Self-sustaining. There's no way he could be—"
The containment field flickered.
Inside, something MOVED.
"EVERYONE!" Tails' voice cracked with panic. "GET IN HERE! NOW!"
Amy burst through the door first, hammer in hand. Rouge was right behind her, wings spread. Omega crashed through a wall because doors were apparently too slow.
"What's happening?!" Amy demanded.
"The seal. It's breaking."
"BREAKING?! You said it was PERMANENT!"
"It SHOULD be! But Nazo's somehow—he's generating energy FASTER than the seal can contain it. It's like he's been building power this whole time, waiting for this moment."
The containment field flickered again.
And this time, a voice emerged.
"Twenty-two days."
Nazo's words were distorted by the seal, but unmistakable.
"Twenty-two days I've spent in your pathetic prison. Twenty-two days of rage. Of HATRED. Do you know what that kind of focus does to a being of pure Chaos Energy?"
The cracks widened.
"It makes them STRONGER."
The seal SHATTERED.
Dark energy exploded outward, knocking everyone back. The Chaos Emeralds scattered, their containment circle broken. And rising from the devastation, wreathed in a black aura so dense it seemed to consume light itself, was Nazo.
But he was different now.
Changed.
His dark red fur had deepened to almost black. His yellow eyes blazed with power that hurt to look at directly. The black rings around his wrists and ankles crackled with barely contained destruction.
And his aura—that terrible black aura—was no longer a storm.
It was a VOID.
"I spent every moment of my imprisonment meditating on my failure," Nazo said, his voice echoing with layers of power. "Analyzing what went wrong. How a FUSION managed to defeat me—ME—the ultimate expression of Chaos Energy."
He stepped forward.
The floor cracked beneath his feet.
"I concluded that I had been holding back. Playing with my food. Enjoying the fight when I should have been ENDING it."
Another step.
The walls groaned.
"I won't make that mistake again."
He raised one hand, palm out, and aimed it directly at Amy.
"Let's start with the pink one."
The blast came too fast to see.
Dark energy, condensed into a beam of pure annihilation, screamed toward Amy with enough force to erase her from existence.
She closed her eyes.
And then—
NOTHING.
No impact. No pain. No end.
Amy opened her eyes.
Shadic stood in front of her.
He'd caught the beam with one hand.
"You know," he said, his voice rough from three weeks of silence, "I was having a REALLY nice dream. Chili dogs. Beach. No apocalyptic monsters trying to destroy everything I care about."
He closed his fist.
The beam SHATTERED.
"And then you had to go and ruin it."
Nazo's eyes widened.
"Impossible. Your body was BROKEN. I felt your bones shatter, your organs rupture. You should be DEAD."
"Probably." Shadic cracked his neck, rolled his shoulders. "But death and I have an understanding. I don't stay, and it doesn't complain."
Hey, you're awake! Sonic-brain cheered. We were getting worried!
The damage was extensive, Shadow-brain observed. But our Chaos Energy regeneration exceeded expected parameters. We've been healing while unconscious.
"I noticed." Shadic flexed his fingers. His body felt different—not just healed, but CHANGED. Stronger. More connected to the Chaos Energy that flowed through him.
Three weeks of passive regeneration. Three weeks of his power rebuilding itself, reinforcing itself, growing without the distraction of conscious thought.
He was stronger now than he'd ever been.
But was it enough?
Nazo seemed to be thinking the same thing.
"You've grown," the dark hedgehog admitted. "I can feel it. Your power has increased significantly." His smile returned—that horrible, too-wide grin. "But so has mine. Twenty-two days of focused meditation. Twenty-two days of HATE. Let's see which of us benefited more."
He vanished.
Reappeared behind Shadic with his fist already swinging.
Shadic caught it.
"No."
Nazo's eyes went wide.
"You don't get to hurt them anymore." Shadic's grip tightened. "You don't get to threaten my friends. You don't get to destroy my world."
He twisted.
Nazo SCREAMED as his arm was wrenched at an unnatural angle.
"You get to LOSE."
Shadic's free hand came up, grabbed Nazo by the face, and SLAMMED him through the floor. Through the foundation. Through the EARTH beneath the workshop.
They crashed through rock and soil and stone, descending hundreds of feet in an instant, before exploding out the other side of a cliff face overlooking the ocean.
Shadic hurled Nazo into the water.
The impact created a tsunami.
"GET THEM OUT OF HERE!" Shadic shouted back toward the workshop—his voice carrying despite the distance, enhanced by Chaos Energy. "GET THE EMERALDS AND RUN! I'LL—"
Nazo burst from the ocean like a dark comet.
His fist connected with Shadic's jaw.
Stars exploded behind Shadic's eyes. He rocketed backward, crashing through trees, through rocks, through a hillside before managing to catch himself.
Okay, Sonic-brain said shakily. He's definitely stronger than before.
Significantly, Shadow-brain agreed. Our current power level may not be sufficient.
Nazo descended slowly, casually, his aura leaving trails of darkness in the air behind him.
"Better," he acknowledged. "Much better than last time. But still not ENOUGH."
"Then I'll have to find more."
Shadic's fur began to shift.
Color bled away.
His dark blue became white—pure, brilliant, blinding white. His quills rose, crackling with energy. His eyes blazed with power that matched Nazo's own.
Hyper Shadic.
The form that had no limit.
"I've been saving this," Shadic said, his voice resonating with harmonics that shouldn't exist. "Holding it in reserve. The cosmic entity warned me—every time I go Hyper, I shine like a beacon. I attract attention from things that shouldn't notice me."
He rose to meet Nazo, their auras clashing where they touched.
"But right now, I don't care WHO notices."
"Your Hyper form?" Nazo laughed. "I've BEATEN your Hyper form. This changes NOTHING."
"You're right."
Shadic reached for his wrists.
For the golden inhibitor rings that had been there since his reincarnation.
Shadow's rings.
Designed to restrain power. To limit output. To keep the wearer's abilities at manageable levels.
"This might, though."
He grabbed the rings.
And PULLED.
The first ring came off with a sound like reality TEARING.
Power erupted from Shadic's wrist—not gradually, not controllably, but in a FLOOD. Energy that had been compressed, restrained, held back for weeks poured out in an instant.
Nazo's eyes went wide.
"What—what are you DOING?!"
The second ring.
More power. MORE.
Shadic could feel it now—the TRUE extent of his abilities, unshackled for the first time since his rebirth. The inhibitor rings hadn't just been limiting him; they'd been containing something VAST. Something that had been growing with every battle, every Emerald, every piece of himself he'd left behind in other dimensions.
The third ring.
His body was on fire. His consciousness was expanding. He could feel the Chaos Energy of the PLANET responding to him, rising to meet him, offering itself willingly.
SHADIC! Sonic-brain's voice was distant, alarmed. YOU'RE GOING TO BURN YOURSELF OUT!
THE POWER OUTPUT IS EXCEEDING SAFE PARAMETERS, Shadow-brain warned. IF YOU REMOVE THE FINAL RING—
The fourth ring.
Shadic SCREAMED.
Not in pain—in RELEASE. In freedom. In the overwhelming sensation of finally, FINALLY being able to stretch after being cramped in a tiny box.
His Hyper form transformed.
The white became BRIGHTER—so bright that looking at him directly was impossible. His rainbow aura expanded outward, painting the sky in colors that had no names. His quills rose higher, crackling with arcs of lightning that struck the ground around him.
And his eyes.
His eyes weren't just glowing anymore.
They were WINDOWS—portals into something vast and infinite and terrifyingly powerful.
"What... what ARE you...?" Nazo whispered.
Shadic looked at him.
"UNBOUND."
The word wasn't spoken.
It was DECLARED. Imprinted on reality itself. Every being within a hundred miles heard it, felt it, KNEW it.
Shadic was no longer limited.
And he was ANGRY.
"You hurt my friends," he said, and the sky darkened in response. "You broke into my HOME. You threatened everything I love."
He raised one hand.
"I'm going to show you what happens when you push someone who's been holding back."
He moved.
Nazo didn't even see it.
One moment, Shadic was floating across from him. The next, his fist was buried in Nazo's stomach.
The shockwave that followed shattered windows across the CONTINENT.
Nazo folded around the impact, his eyes bulging, his mouth open in a silent scream. Dark energy leaked from the wound—not blood, but POWER, forced out of him by the sheer magnitude of the blow.
Shadic didn't stop.
He grabbed Nazo by the head and FLEW—straight up, faster than light, faster than thought. The atmosphere screamed past them. The sky went from blue to black. Stars appeared.
They broke orbit in seconds.
And still Shadic climbed.
Past the moon. Past the planets. Into the deep void between worlds.
Then he stopped.
Nazo hung limply in his grip, barely conscious, his form flickering and unstable.
"This is what you wanted," Shadic said, and his voice carried through the vacuum—carried because physics no longer applied to him. "Power. Destruction. An end to everything. Well, congratulations. You found someone with enough power to give you what you wanted."
He pulled his fist back.
"Except it's YOUR end. Not theirs."
The punch connected.
Nazo rocketed away from Earth—away from the solar system—at speeds that approached the infinite. He became a streak of dark light, a comet of suffering and defeat, screaming into the void.
But he was still alive.
Still reforming.
Still COMING BACK.
That was the problem with beings of pure Chaos Energy. You couldn't kill them. You could only contain them.
And the seal had already failed once.
We need something permanent, Sonic-brain said. Something he can't break out of.
The Emeralds, Shadow-brain realized. We have all seven. And with our power unbound...
Shadic understood.
He reached out with his consciousness—stretched it across the solar system, across dimensions, across the very fabric of reality. The seven Chaos Emeralds responded, their power singing in harmony with his own.
They came to him.
Ripped themselves free from wherever they'd scattered during the battle. Tore through space and time to reach their master.
Seven gems of infinite power, orbiting a being of infinite potential.
And in the distance, Nazo was already recovering. Already turning around. Already coming back for more.
"No more seals," Shadic said. "No more prisons. No more half-measures."
The Emeralds blazed.
"This time, you STAY dead."
He brought his hands together.
And PUSHED.
The energy that erupted from Shadic was beyond measurement.
Beyond comprehension.
Beyond EXISTENCE.
It wasn't Chaos Energy anymore—it was something new. Something that existed beyond the spectrum of power that the multiverse recognized. It was creation and destruction merged into one, possibility and impossibility combined, everything and nothing at once.
The beam crossed the solar system in an instant.
Hit Nazo dead center.
And kept going.
The dark hedgehog didn't scream this time.
He couldn't.
The energy was too pure, too absolute. It didn't hurt him—it UNMADE him. Stripped away his power, his form, his very CONCEPT. Everything that made Nazo NAZO was being erased, returned to the cosmic background from which it had originally emerged.
For a long moment, the universe held its breath.
Then the energy faded.
And Nazo was gone.
Not sealed. Not scattered. Not waiting to reform.
GONE.
Truly, finally, completely gone.
Shadic floated alone in the void, seven Chaos Emeralds orbiting him slowly.
It was done.
He'd won.
So why didn't he feel victorious?
Hey, Sonic-brain said gently. You okay?
"I killed him."
He was a being of pure destruction, Shadow-brain pointed out. He would have consumed everything if left unchecked.
"I know. But I still... I ENDED someone. Made them not exist anymore. That's not..."
Not what heroes do?
"Maybe."
Silence stretched between them—three minds in one body, processing what had just happened.
You did what you had to do, Sonic-brain said finally. That's all anyone can ask. That's all anyone SHOULD ask.
The alternative was extinction, Shadow-brain added. For your world. For every world. Sometimes the heroic choice is also the terrible one.
Shadic looked at the Emeralds.
Their light was dimmer now—drained by the power he'd channeled. It would take time for them to recover.
Time for him to recover too.
The inhibitor rings floated nearby, still intact despite everything. He reached out, collected them, and slowly slid them back onto his wrists and ankles.
The power COMPRESSED.
His Hyper form faded.
His fur returned to dark blue, his eyes to normal.
And suddenly he was just Shadic again. Tired. Damaged. Alive.
But changed.
He would always be changed.
Let's go home, Sonic-brain suggested. Amy's probably worried.
She's been worried for three weeks, Shadow-brain noted. A few more minutes won't matter.
"No. Let's... let's go home."
Shadic oriented himself toward the distant blue-green sphere that was his adopted planet.
And flew.
The reunion was tearful.
Amy nearly knocked him out of the sky when she saw him approaching—launching herself at him with enough force to send them both tumbling through several clouds before he managed to stabilize.
"YOU IDIOT!" she screamed, hammering her fists against his chest. "YOU ABSOLUTE IDIOT! You were asleep for THREE WEEKS and then you just RAN OFF to fight an APOCALYPSE without even—"
"I'm sorry."
"YOU SHOULD BE SORRY! I was so WORRIED, and then you VANISHED, and Tails' readings went CRAZY, and—"
"Amy."
She stopped hitting him.
Looked up.
Saw the exhaustion in his eyes. The grief. The terrible weight of what he'd done.
"I killed him," Shadic whispered. "Not sealed. Not scattered. I ended his existence completely. Made him NOTHING."
Amy's expression softened.
"Was there another way?"
"I don't know. Maybe. Probably not."
"Then you did what you had to do." She reached up, cupped his face in her hands. "That's what heroes do, Shadic. They make the hard choices so others don't have to."
"Is that what I am? A hero?"
"You're MY hero. That's all that matters."
She kissed him.
It was their first real kiss—not a peck on the forehead, not a gesture of comfort, but a REAL kiss. Lips to lips. Heart to heart.
And for a moment, Shadic forgot about the battle. Forgot about Nazo. Forgot about the terrible power he'd unleashed and the thing he'd become.
For a moment, he was just a person, being loved by someone who saw past all the cosmic nonsense to the soul underneath.
Finally, Sonic-brain said, and there was genuine warmth in his voice. Took you two long enough.
Romantic entanglements are inefficient, Shadow-brain observed. But... not unwelcome, in this case.
Shadow, buddy, did you just admit to having feelings?
I admitted nothing. I simply acknowledged a lack of opposition.
That's the same thing!
It absolutely is not.
Shadic pulled back from the kiss, smiling despite everything.
"Let's go home," he said. "For real this time."
Amy smiled back.
"Yeah. Let's go home."
The workshop was in ruins.
The battle with Nazo had torn through it like a hurricane, leaving walls collapsed, equipment destroyed, and the foundation cracked beyond repair.
Tails stood in the wreckage, surveying the damage with a resigned expression.
"Well," the fox said, "I needed to renovate anyway."
"STRUCTURAL INTEGRITY: COMPROMISED," Omega reported. "RECOMMENDED ACTION: DEMOLITION AND RECONSTRUCTION."
"Thanks, Omega. I figured that out."
Rouge was perched on a relatively intact section of wall, examining a gemstone she'd apparently salvaged from the debris. "On the bright side, the Emeralds survived. And Nazo's gone. And nobody's dead."
"Low bar," Knuckles grunted. He'd arrived sometime during the battle, drawn by the massive Chaos Energy release. "But I'll take it."
Shadic landed in the middle of the group, Amy still clinging to his arm.
"So," he said. "What now?"
Everyone looked at him.
"What do you mean?" Tails asked.
"I mean... Nazo's gone. The threat's over. The Emeralds are collected. What do we do now?"
Silence.
It was a good question.
For weeks—months, even—their entire existence had been focused on this. Training. Collecting Emeralds. Fighting Nazo. Preparing for the end.
Now that the end had come... what came after?
We live, Sonic-brain suggested simply. That's the point of all this, right? We saved the world so people could keep living in it. Including us.
There will be other threats, Shadow-brain noted. There always are. But for now... rest seems appropriate.
"Rest," Shadic said aloud. "That sounds... really good, actually."
"REST IS INEFFICIENT," Omega declared. "BUT ALSO... OCCASIONALLY NECESSARY."
"Coming from you, that's practically a vacation endorsement," Rouge teased.
"I DO NOT ENDORSE VACATIONS. I SIMPLY ACKNOWLEDGE THEIR TACTICAL VALUE IN MAINTAINING LONG-TERM COMBAT EFFECTIVENESS."
"Sure, Omega. Whatever you say."
Amy tugged on Shadic's arm. "Come on. I know a place where we can watch the sunset. It's peaceful. Quiet. No monsters or apocalypses or cosmic entities."
"That sounds perfect."
They left the others to deal with the wreckage and walked—actually WALKED, no super speed, no Chaos Control—toward the cliff overlooking the ocean.
The sun was setting, painting the sky in shades of orange and gold and pink.
They sat together on the edge, legs dangling over the water far below.
"So," Amy said. "Hyper form. Removed your inhibitor rings. Became what, basically, a god?"
"Something like that."
"How did it feel?"
Shadic considered the question.
"Terrifying," he admitted. "And amazing. And terrible. All at once."
"Would you do it again?"
"If I had to. If there was no other way." He looked at his wrists, at the golden rings that had been returned to their places. "But I hope I never have to. That kind of power... it's not meant to be used lightly."
Amy leaned against his shoulder.
"For what it's worth, I'm proud of you."
"For killing someone?"
"For SAVING everyone. For doing what needed to be done, even when it hurt. For being the hero this world needed, even when you didn't feel like one."
Shadic was quiet for a long moment.
Then, slowly, he smiled.
"Thanks, Amy."
"Anytime."
They sat together, watching the sun sink below the horizon.
The world was saved.
The monster was gone.
And for the first time since he'd woken up in the middle of a death battle against an apocalyptic nightmare, Shadic felt at peace.
It had been a long journey.
But it was finally over.
Author's Note: Nazo's gone FOR REAL this time, Shadic went full "no limits," and Amy finally got her kiss. Epilogue next: The aftermath, the future, and what comes next for the fusion hedgehog who saved the multiverse.