Shadow: The Origin Of A Legend

Chapter 32

I slide through the crowd, hood up, keeping my breathing shallow and quiet; all around me, people bustle about, and I move with the crowd's current. An anxious feeling sours my stomach, but I choke down my nervousness, forcing myself to focus only on my goal. Everyone here has a metro card. And each one is going to have to use it. I just need to find someone who has it in their hands, or whose pockets are loose enough... We draw nearer to the turnstiles, and I notice the person in front of me shuffling awkwardly to grab at their wallet. Slinking behind them, I wait until they have the card in their hands and are sliding their wallet back into their pocket. You idiot, why would you put your wallet away if you're just going to have to get it back out in ten seconds to put your card away? I mentally berate them as I snag the card out of their hands, quickly turning and vanishing into the torrent of humans again. Moreover, why would you keep something so precious balanced so precariously between two fingers? Slipping the card into my hoodie pocket, I glare out at the groups, eyes glinting; scanning the masses, I spot an inattentive human on the other side of the gates, their back pressed up against a grate as they chatter aimlessly on their cell phone. Sneaking up behind them, I feign reclining on the gate as well, slowly creeping my hand towards the card in their hand sticking through the holes in the grate.

"So, that's the plan, huh?" The human chirps into her cellphone. Static noises issue from the phone and my ears flick, unable to decipher what's being said. My claws wrap around the card as the woman starts talking again. "Yeah, I've been tracking it, I know. Suuuuper important and all that. But you know you can trust me, right?" Sliding the card slowly from between her fingers, I ease my hand away, keeping a close eye on her. Luckily, she isn't paying any attention to me; the moment the slide of plastic is fully in my hands, I whirl around and rush back into the crowd, blending in with the arriving group to dash back to Scourge. I feel bad for leaving him so suddenly, but hopefully the fact that I now have two metro cards in my hands will make up for it.

Searching the crowd, I desperately try to find my bright green friend in the sea of multicolored coats and blurring figures. He'll be standing still, hopefully, and he always sticks out like a sore thumb when he isn't lurking in an alleyways or kicking over trashcans; therefore, I'll be able to see him easily.

Right?

------------------

Sighing, Scourge taps his foot on the ground, arms crossed, looking anxiously at the throng of people around him. Every now and then someone knocks into him, but for the most part people move easily around him. Where did Shadow go? Is he gonna come back? He wouldn't ditch me... Would he? Frowning, the emerald hedgehog starts sweating nervously. He's so weird, anyways--his moods change so erratically, and half the time he has that same scowl on his face. Something about him changed over those two years--he's more unstable now. A little more likely to act out. And what the hell happened to him back in that store? It was like he wasn't seeing anything in front of him, just paralyzed, for whatever reason. Scratching his neck, he cranes his head up to look at the ceiling. It's plain tiles, pretty standard for a station like this, and curved; or at least, he assumes the entirety of it is tiled, since the humans towering above the short green hedgehog make it difficult to really see anything.

"Hey, there!" A long-anticipated voice chirps in Scourge's ear, causing him to whirl around. Shadow stood in a slightly stiff-looking stance to his right, looking uncharacteristically cheerful. His hands were in his hoodie's pocket, and his hood was still drawn up around his head.

"Sh-Shadz?" Scourge raised an eyebrow, slightly alarmed. It's just like I said, he's behaving so erratically! "Where were you?"

"Sorry for ditching you like that!" Shadow steps a bit closer as a human veers off to their left, ignoring the two, and stepping right where Shadow had been. Baffled, the green hedgehog stares. How did he react to that so easily? "It would've been a little bit difficult to do this without being alone, though, you know?" Grinning, Shadow suddenly pulls his hand out of his pocket and poses, leaning back a little bit, two metro cards between his fingers. Scourge gasps, and Shadow makes a peculiar chuckling noise, almost like a giggle--that can't be right, he doesn't even ever actually laugh, let alone giggle--closing his eyes and tipping his head to one side slightly.