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Another day, another successful mission. Team Dark just came back from their latest assignment, an infiltration that had, again, turned into a full out battle against the Doctor’s robots. Explosions, bullets, Chaos Spears, spin dashes, you name it.
G.U.N. had sent Rouge and her team to investigate what was supposed to be a deactivated base. Turns out the base used to be deactivated , as they suspected. They had been joined by Sonic and Tails along the way and had made short work of the base.
“No wonder this turned into a fireworks show”, grumbled the white bat, letting out a yawn as she stretched her arms and wings.
“I ENJOYED THIS LATEST MISSION”, responded her walking arsenal of a friend.
“Of course you did, Megs.” Rouge giggled. “What about you, Handsome?”
The dark hedgehog walking beside them simply shrugged. Some would call him indifferent, or even rude, but the jewel thief knew better.
“Alright boys, I’m spent. Let’s get back home. See you around Blue, Tails.”
And with that, Shadow Chaos Controlled them back to Central City. They made their report to Commander Tower, and with a promise to send a written report in a timely manner, they went back home to their shared apartment over Club Rouge .
Once there, they tended to their own after-mission rituals. This time, Rouge decided to take a shower instead of her preferred long soak in a hot bath. Once cleaned and clad in her favorite pjs, a pair of dark shorts and a faded band t-shirt from her early adult days, she went to the kitchen in search of something to eat. As expected, she found Shadow curled up on his end of the huge L shaped couch under his favorite blanket, the TV running some random cooking show. Omega was sitting in the corner of the room beside Shadow’s side of the couch, quietly recharging for the night.
The bat didn’t need Shadow to tell her he was exhausted, his attitude and body language took care of that for him. However, something had been bothering the hedgehog lately and she had yet to put her finger on it. For the time being, she shrugged it off and went to crash on her end of the couch and opened her phone.
“What do you want to order tonight Hun? I don’t feel like cooking tonight.”
Shadow’s answering snort made her fight a smirk.
“You’re never in the mood for cooking. Probably better that way anyway…” the hybrid mumbled playfully from his spot.
“Excuse me if my culinary talents are not up to this Hedgie’s fine palate’s standard” she huffed, crossing her arms under her ample chest.
“ Culinary talents ?” Shadow snorted in laughter as he lifted his head to look at her, “Rouge, you almost set the kitchen on fire twice . And that’s only last week.”
“Bad Hedgehog. Bad. I’m keeping all the spring rolls to myself then.”
“No you don’t, I want the veggies ones. With plum sauce.”
“Chicken fried rice like usual?”
“Yeah, add more of those shrimps fritters we had last time.”
“Added.”
“Thanks.”
There you go. How to make hedgie hedgehogs give you their order 101.
This newest mission was a total shit show. A perfect example of Murphy’s law. Omega had been banned from joining from the very beginning and this had been Rouge’s first red flag. The second red flag had come in the form of their current mission’s leader, Lt Williams. The woman was an extremely competent soldier. But that wasn’t the problem. Williams was a pro human. Despite her being relatively young, she was in her early thirties, the woman had an outdated view on mobians and disapproved Tower’s new policies, mostly him now hiring mobians into the ranks.
They had been set up. Rouge was furious. This mission was doomed to fail right from the start, the higher ups were expecting them to fail, and fail they did. Spectacularly at that. The item they were supposed to retrieve had been destroyed, the potential intel on Eggman’s whereabouts was all but unusable because some idiot had deemed it a good idea to store the hard drive containing the intel in a storage box full of explosives in a non secured transport, and the list kept on growing longer. They had been sent into a badnik infested lair with little to no support because paperwork had been misfiled and the squad sent along with… huh… The squad sent along with Williams was nothing but a bunch of rookies? What the actual Hell? She was tempted to take a page from Shadow’s book and swear her head off.
She was now on her way to Tower’s office to make her report. Once there, she knocked impatiently and crossed her arms to wait for an answer. Fortunately for her temper, it came right away. She entered the office and stopped right in front of the massive mahogany desk. Arms still crossed, she glared right at her boss.
“Explain yourself.” she gritted out. Losing her cool wouldn’t do her any favor here.
“I certainly will. But first, where is Shadow?”
“I sent him home after I patched him up in the field. He’s with a very pissed off Omega as we speak.” came the clipped answer.
“I see.” said the man calmly, his arms behind his back, heterochromatic eyes staring at Rouge.The Commander took a breath and gestured to a chair behind the bat. “Take a seat Rouge.” He began.
“I’m fine standing.”
“I insist. We have much to discuss.” came the surprisingly patient answer.
Noticing this, Rouge let out a sigh and took a seat in one of the human sized chairs facing the commander’s desk. She kept her arms crossed and didn’t let go of her furious expression.
“This mission was a setup.”
“Indeed it was.”
“No shit.”
“Language, Rouge. I already have to deal with this from Shadow, that’s more than enough.” the man sighed, rubbing his forehead tiredly. “As I was saying, this mission was a setup. But not for Team Dark. The one being set up was Lieutenant Williams.”
“I beg your pardon?” cut Rouge, her posture relaxing somewhat in her surprise.
“You heard me right. In the last months, several agents have been sending complaints regarding Williams… work ethics. I don’t know what exactly happened, but she went from a bright recruit with potential to a hardened soldier with a vendetta. We had reasons to believe she had been sabotaging her own missions.”
“What does this have to do with Team Dark?” she asked, skeptical.
“All the missions that had been sabotaged by Lieutenant Williams were all supposed to be beneficial to mobians specifically. Be it rescue missions after a Robotnik attack or simply evacuations after a natural event, such as the flooding your team was sent to help with three months ago.”
“Come again?”
“We set this mission up in order to gather proof of her sabotaging. We could not risk the safety of the civilians, thus we had to rely on you and Shadow. But in order for the setup to work properly, we could not inform either of you of our plans. You are both too good at your job and would have been watching her closely. It had to be natural.”
Rouge thought about all of this for a moment while Tower waited patiently.
“So you set this all up knowing she would do everything to make sure Shadow and I would get blamed for the mission failure.”
“Not only that, but I suspected she would also set Shadow up to get injured. You mentioned you had to patch him up? I do hope it was nothing serious.” the human asked, his mismatched eyes sincere.
“He’ll live. Mostly scratches and bruises, and he hurt his shoulder when he pushed one of the others out of the way of a falling beam. They were not rookies, weren’t they?” asked the spy, suddenly exhausted.
“They were not rookies”, confirmed the commander.
“Should have noticed that…”
“I will wait for both of your reports. Do you wish to add anything else, Agent Rouge?”
“No, Commander.”
“You are dismissed. Go get some rest.”
“Yes, Sir.”
When she got back to the apartment, Rouge was unsurprised to see shadow was absent from the common living spaces. She let out a tired sigh, rubbing her eyes.
“Right… Shower first, talk with traumatized hedgehog after.” She mumbled to no one in particular.
One hot shower later, she went to Shadow’s bedroom door and knocked lightly.
“Shadow, I’m back. Can I come in?”
No answer. Maybe he’s already asleep? Yeah right, as if he would manage to sleep after that shit show.
“Shadow, I’m coming in. Make a sound if you don’t want me to come in.”
Opening the door, she immediately saw the light from the light on the nightstand between the bed and the door. Here was her teammate, sitting on his bed over the covers. He was sitting cross legged, his hands resting on his lap as he stared blankly at them. The jewel thief quietly got closer to the bed and sat on the hedge of it.
“Hey hun, how’s your shoulder?” she asked in a soft tone. At his lack of acknowledgement, she got a little bit closer, inspecting the injured limb. “Still looks a bit swollen. Can I touch it to evaluate the damage?”
Again, no response. Now she was getting worried. She didn’t dare touch him, as she had no way of knowing how far in his own head he was at the moment. She was still debating touching his arm when he finally said something.
“I’m only good at destroying lives.”
What?
“What did you say, sugar?” She asked, hoping she had misheard, but knowing it was futile.
“ Everything I touch gets destroyed, just like the lives of everyone around me.”
Those words would hunt Rouge for a very long time.
That bitch.
The following missions were a series of disaster after disaster. Rouge had done anything she could to get Shadow to forget whatever the former Lt Williams had told him, but the hedgehog stayed withdrawn into himself. The missions did not fail, but the results were far from the standard expected from Team Dark. Rouge took the blame for most of it, but she knew they would need to get better results soon. Tower was aware of Shadow’s… difficulties, but even the Commander couldn’t overlook it for long.
A week ago, Rouge had received an official letter, embossed with the Commander’s seal and all that fancy bs, informing her of Williams new status. The Woman had been arrested and was now expelled from G.U.N.’s ranks. She would be prosecuted in martial court at a later date. Neither her, nor Shadow, were required to testify. A simple official letter authorizing the Commander to cite their respective reports, anonymously, was enough from them.
But not even the fate of Williams was enough to cheer Rouge.
Her salvation came after one such mission in the form of a bubbly, pink hedgehog.
The girl had been hanging with Sonic and Tails, the trio having a pic-nic in a park when the Doctor’s robots swarmed the place. Rouge and her boys had been in the sector as well and both teams had teamed up to clean the place of robots in a record time. The civilians had evacuated the park to get to safety and no one had been hurt. While Sonic was busy sending Eggman packing, Tails was already beginning the cleaning and Amy was making sure everyone was uninjured, insisting on patching up even the smallest of scratches.
She was currently tending to a gash in Shadow’s arm, most likely caused by a random spin dash. The pink hedgehog was focused on the dark one’s arm, tongue sticking out in concentration as she cleaned the cut with a clean cloth when her hand grabbed on his as she moved a bit. From this close, there was no way she could have missed the flinch he made.
“Are you hurt anywhere else?” she asked, worry filling her eyes.
“... No.”
“Are you sure? I just want to help you, Shadow. I don’t like it when my friends are hurting.” Amy said, frowning.
“You shouldn’t stay close to me. I’ll only end up hurting…”
“Nonsense. I have nothing to fear from you, Shadow The Hedgehog.”
“But… My hands are covered in blood…”
“I know.” the pink girl acknowledged, as she took both of the hybrid’s hands in hers. “But you know, they are also covered in your own blood, shadow. How many times did you bled for others? Before, and after your fifty year long sleep?” she said, her eyes now fierce and her grip strong on his hands. “Your hands can also give and nurture life you know”, Amy said with a soft smile.
At this, Shadow looked at her with such a stunned and confused expression, the girl couldn’t help herself as she dissolved into a fit of giggles. The dark furred male finally cracked a smirk as he let himself be enveloped into the now light hearted mood.
“I’ll have to take you for your words then.”
“And you dang well should! Mister Ultimate Lifeform! Come to my home after you report for your mission, I’ll show you!” Amy said, her bubbly personality back in full force.
“Alright, I’ll meet you tomorrow, Rose.”
“Yay!”
And that’s how Shadow The Hedgehog found himself in the middle of Amy Rose’s flower garden. Everywhere he looked, there were different kinds of flowers. Roses bushes, obviously, but there were also many other colorful species. From lilies to geraniums, without forgetting about giant sunflowers and tiny forget-me-nots.
Amy patiently explained how each flower species had specific needs in terms of watering and sun. She explained why each bush and each flower was planted in a specific spot and not in a random one, as many seemed to think.
From that, Shadow understood how each flower needed care and patience. He was enjoying himself so much, he didn’t even realise how much time had passed right until Amy shoved a cup of tea and a plate of pastries under his nose. Now aware of how hungry he was, he paused his inspection of a patch of orange flowers. Tiger Lilies, Amy supplied.
They sat together at a table placed in the shade of a pergola, chatting amiably about the garden, Amy answering Shadow’s question in an enthusiastic tone.
“I need to move a patch of petunias, my neighbor asked me if I could give her some for her daughter’s garden. Would you like to help me?”
“Me?”
“Of course! Who else? Silly!”
By the end of the afternoon, they were done with the petunias and Amy had asked Shadow what his favorite flower was in her garden. He had told her he liked the tiny blue flowers quite a lot, and Amy had smiled knowingly. The agent had even managed to be surprised when his pink friend had presented a potted patch of forget-me-nots to him. He was smiling softly as he took the flowers home with him.
What started as a single as a single pot of flowers turned into multiple and soon enough, Shadow’s room and the living room’s balcony were overflowing with plants of all sizes and colors. Books about botany had found their place in Shadow's bookshelf as well as in the common living spaces.
However, the hedgehog was now unsatisfied. He lamented the fact they lived in the middle of the city and had no space for a garden. One evening after a mission, Shadow was watering his plants when he brought it up to Rouge. The jewel thief took a moment to mull this over. True, they could not grow a garden like the one Amy had… But…
“Oh! I know! Let’s make an urban garden!” she squealed.
“Urban garden?”
“Yes! A garden, but in the city. We can make it on the roof! There’s plenty of unused space on the roof of the building, we can build flower boxes and even create a space with a table and lounge chairs, just like at Amy’s place.”
“I ALSO WISH TO TAKE PART IN THIS TEAM BUILDING PROJECT.”
“Really?” Asked Rouge, getting more excited.
“AFFIRMATIVE. I HAVE BEEN READING ABOUT FLOWERS IN MY SPARE TIME. I FOUND THE SAME BOOKS AS SHADOW’S ON INTERNET.”
“I like the idea. Let’s try it.”
And build an urban garden they did. Rouge had hired a team to do a proper cleaning of the roof of the building and had them build a pergola in one corner of the now mostly empty area. In the meantime, Shadow had visited Amy to get more advice on what kind of plant they should choose. He was now aware that even if some plants thrived in a garden like Amy’s, it didn’t mean whey would grow well and survived in a garden in the middle of a city where the average temperature and lack of shade were higher.
That’s how the two hedgehogs came back with more ideas and a bunch of vegetable seeds. Within a week, the roof of Club Rouge building was now organized in rows of flowers boxes, some already full of colorful blooms, some others seemingly empty, but soon to be filled with greenery as well.
Everything was doing well, the hedgehog was taking care of watering each and every plant the right amount of water at the right frequency. He enjoyed his gardening, and he enjoyed the help of his team. He even got excited when the first vegetables started growing in their respective plants. His first harvest was a handful of beans that he munched on happily while watering the rest of the garden during a hot evening.
But eventually, as the summer progressed, came the heat waves. While the members of Team Dark could hide away in the climatized building, the flowers had to stay outside.
One evening, after a three day long mission, Shadow came back home to a few dead patches of flowers. His mood took a hit at this moment, his disappointment clear as day on his face. Omega has taken the watering can and filled it up with fresh water. The robot started to water the flowers directly beside Shadow, taking the hybrid out of his own thoughts. After a nod of acknowledgement, the instrument was passed along and they both got to work, giving a chance to every other plant left.
Team Dark and the blue and yellow duo had once again teamed up to foil Eggman’s plans. The search and destroy mission had turned into a competition of who would be Sonic and Rouge were celebrating and chatting excitedly while Shadow was staying a bit farther off in the shade of a tree, smiling softly at the display. Omega was about to join him when he noticed Tails, sitting beside the Tornado and tinkering with one of his numerous gadgets. After a moment observing the kit genius, an idea formed in Omega’s software and he changed his mind, approaching the kit instead. Tails lifted his head up and raised an eyebrow at his steel companion.
“TINY FOX.”
“Omega,” the kid acknowledged, used to his friend’s way of speaking.
“I HAVE A FAVOR TO ASK.”
“Ask away Omega! What can I do for you?!” Tails answered immediately, tinkering forgotten in favor of shifting his attention onto his metallic friend. Omega didn’t interact much with people other than his team, so him asking a favor was exceptional. The bot joined the kit properly and simply plopped himself down beside him. After a moment of consideration, he turned his optic lenses to focus on the curious child beside him.
“SHADOW HAS STARTED A GARDEN ON THE ROOF OF CLUB ROUGE”, he started.
“I heard of this, it’s very cool!”
“... SHADOW LOST SOME OF HIS PLANTS DURING OUR LAST MISSION.”
“Oh… I’m sorry.” murmured young fox, ears folding a bit on his head in sadness.
“DO NOT BE SORRY FOR SOMETHING YOU HAVE NO CONTROL OVER.”
“Huh?” Tails looked confused by the robot’s answer, not expecting it.
“YOU HAD NO CONTROL OVER THE FATE OF SHADOW’S PLANTS. YOU HAVE NOTHING TO BE SORRY FOR.” stated the artificial being.
“Oh… Okay. I understand. What can I help you with then?”
“SHADOW’S PLANTS NEED WATER.”
“Indeed, do you want me to visit and water them when you guys are out? I certainly could.”
“NEGATIVE. YOU ARE OFTEN WITH US, OR OTHERWISE BUSY ON YOUR OWN MISSIONS.”
“Right,” nodded the fox, putting a hand to his chin, thinking. “I know! What about an automatic watering system? I could make it all programmable…”
If Omega could have smiled, he would have. Instead, he dimmed his optical lights in happy satisfaction. The killer bot and the fox kit spent some time discussing plans regarding their new project. To Omega’s demand, Tails had promised to keep it a secret, even from Rouge. The former Eggbot would notify the genius kit the next few times Team Dark would be out of town, allowing the handyfox to visit the roof to take all the measurements he needed for the project.
Their last mission had been a long one. Team Dark had been gone for over two weeks, stationned some seventy kilometers North of Masuri. Rouge was very glad to be back home and her bath was calling her, as she liked to say.
Shadow was no less tired, but first he wanted to check up on the garden. Wondering how many of his plants had died this time.
The hedgehog let out a loud gasp when he got to the roof. Everywhere he looked was green and colorful, just the way he left everything before his mission. But as he inspected and took a closer look at his flowers, Shadow noticed something new : some kind of hose system. It was discreet and you had to be looking for it to even see it, but it was there.
Shadow was now confused. Someone had come to Club Rouge to not only take care of Shadow’s garden, but they had also added a new watering system. The hybrid didn’t need to think twice to guess who was the culprit. Grabbing a handful of beans and tomatoes to munch on, the hedgehog made his way back into the penthouse and grabbed his phone on the kitchen table.
He started a video chat and Tails answered almost right away. The fox had grease on his muzzle and seemed to be tinkering on his plane.
“Oh! Shadow! Can I help you with something? Do you guys need help dealing with Eggman? Sonic isn’t home, but I can contact him easily and send him…”
“Miles, breath.” said Shadow, fighting off a smirk. “No help is needed, we just got home after a mission. Everyone made it back unharmed.” he said, leaving it at that.
“Oh! Sorry for rambling. I’m glad you guys made it back safely. Anything I can help you with?”
“Hmph. You tell me.”
“Sorry?”
Shadow’s answer was to deliberately take a bite of his very crunchy yellow beans in full view of the camera. The fox kit’s reaction was immediate.
“Ah! You visited the roof already, didn’t you?” smiled the child, his namesakes visibly switching happily behind him.
“I did.” answered the hedgehog, expression staying neutral.
“I had to ask Amy for her help. She was a huge asset in designing the watering system. The way you organised everything made it easy as well. Each section is programmed to give different quantities or water. It can also be reprogrammed, so if you ever want to change the layout or switch plant species…”
“Miles”, tried Shadow.
“You’ll be able to do everything from a panel I installed beside…”
“Miles.” The hedgehog tried again, but the fox kept on rambling enthusiastically. “Uh… Tails!”
The golden furred mobian stopped talking as the sound of his preferred nickname broke through his rambling.
“Uh. Would you like to come over and explain all of that to me here? I didn’t catch half of what you said…” That last part was mumbled sheepishly.
“Sure! Would tomorrow work for you? I’m in the middle of maintenance on the Tornado.”
“Tomorrow works fine for me. Think you can bring Amy along as well?”
“Will do! Text me the specifics and I’ll confirm everything with her as well.”
“Good. See you tomorrow, Tails.”
Ending the call, Shadow rubbed his forehead tiredly. The mission hadn’t been difficult, but it had taken a lot out of them nonetheless. As he stood up from his place at the kitchen table and was thinking of following Rouge’s example and taking a soak. On his way to his room, he was interrupted by Omega positioning himself in his way.
“What is it, Omega?” he grunted, fighting a yawn.
“QUERY : HOW WAS THE GARDEN?”
“Uh… More green and less dead plants than expected.” murmured Shadow, then he looked properly up to his friend, cocking an eyebrow. “You don’t have anything to do with this, don’t you?” He asked rhetorically.
Omega somehow managed to look smug despite his lack of facial expression. On the other hand, Shadow’s facial expression said it all, he didn’t need words to say “ Thank you ”. Omega patted his smaller friend on the head and moved out of his way, letting him get ready for the night.
The next day, Tails and Amy showed up to Team Dark’s apartment. The pink girl had brought a selection of pastries and freshly baked breads, to the delight of Rouge and Shadow. Cream had asked to tag along and the teens could hear her and Cheese’s excited exclamations as they discovered the urban jungle that was Team Dark’s garden.
Tails took the time to explain how to program the watering system and how they could program each section independently. That way, each type of plant would get the right amount of water. When Shadow mentioned he wanted to still be able to do it himself, but was afraid to forget to turn the system back on when they needed to leave, the fox’s smile got even brighter, if that was even possible.
“Oh! Omega mentioned you’d want to take care of watering the garden yourself without depending on the automatic system to do it for you. So I added moisture sensors in the soil. You can skip a day and the system won’t take over, but if you go over the forty-eight hours mark without watering the plants that need water, the system will take over and do it. It also works for days where it rains. The sensor will tell the software it has enough water, and it won’t add any more water to the plants that don’t need it. “
Shadow nodded along each new explanation, impressed with everything. Thanks to his friends, he wouldn’t need to worry about his believer flowers needing to be watered.
From her spot at their small garden table, Rouge was looking at her little brother with a calculating shine to her eyes. She looked over at Amy and wondered if the girl would be in as well for that new idea of hers.
“Honey?” Never a better time than the present to find out. “What would you think of a four season greenhouse?”
The look Shadow gave her when he turned around was answer enough.
“And you Pinky? You in?” she asked with a smirk.
“You bet I’m in! We’ll have to do some research to get the best layout ever! What would you guys want in the greenhouse? Flowers or vegetables only? Some Vegetables can be harvested all year long…”
Ha well, one more rambling session wouldn’t hurt her, the bat thought with a fond smile. She took a look at the excited faces around herself and couldn’t help thinking back to how her life used to be before she met a traumatized hedgehog in search of himself. And let’s not forget the killer robot who claimed he didn’t care about their “organic sentimentalities”, but went out of his way to find a solution to their introverted friend’s flower problem.
Don’t care, my ass.
She was fully grinning now, but none of the kids took notice, focused as they were about this new challenge.
I really, really need to find a way to thank Amy.
Weeks later, many more urban gardens started popping up on buildings’ roofs and balconies everywhere in Central City. In the years to come, many more would be seen, but none would ever measure up to the one on top of Club Rouge ’s roof in the Night Babylon district. With time, it would become one of the most famous tourist landmarks of the capital.