Maria

The Termination of Emotions

The Commander had many faces, Gerald could sense that much, but it was still prominent that the Commander was irritated by Maria's late absence.

"You claimed your granddaughter would be here in ten minutes Professor Robotnik," the Commander said in a cold voice. "It has almost been twenty, where is she?"

"She'll be arriving shortly." Gerald replied with a nervous chuckle. "Any moment, really."

"Are you telling me you have no control over a simple girl?" the Commander then asked, speaking as if his words were knives designed to cut Gerald like a weed. But Gerald had much tougher skin, and the Commander's argument made the old man flare with anger.

"I'll have you know," Gerald started to say, his tone raising with authority, "Maria is a steadfast and determined young lady who knows her place. If you think for a moment that I do not-"

"Hello." came a small voice from the door, perfectly ending the verbal fight between the Commander and Gerald. "I'm sorry I'm late. Finding clothes acceptable enough for someone in such high honor as the Commander was more trouble than it needed to be."

"Maria!" Gerald said with an angered tone, although he was actually quite relieved. The Commander said nothing as he looked at Maria as if she were an alien.

"So you are Maria Robotnik?" the Commander asked in a firm voice. The girl nodded as she walked forward to give him a handshake. Shadow was close behind her, much to the Commander's surprise.

"Dear god!" the Commander exclaimed as he jumped back in surprise. "What the hell is that thing?!"

"The 'fruit' of Project Shadow, sir." Gerald said, giving the Commander a satisfied smirk. "This is Shadow, the Ultimate Lifeform. He is immune to any long range attack, can live forever, and his blood is able to heal any given disease- including Neuro-Immune Deficiency Syndrome."

The Commander looked at Gerald, then turned his gaze from Shadow, to Maria, and to Shadow again.

"Beginning tomorrow, Project Shadow is to be terminated." the Commander then instructed. He kept his gaze at Shadow before adding, "Including the death of... that."

"Never!" Gerald hollered.

"But Professor," the Commander than said smoothly, "I gave you the terms of my arrival, and you just said what I wanted to hear. Not that I needed it, my men were able to find and go through all of your research notes. Everything you wrote about Project Shadow is now property of GUN, as was the DNA of Black Doom before it. The time has come to take back what was rightfully ours, even if we must do it forcefully!"

Gerald let out a low growl in anger. Coming from the shadows, two GUN agents stepped forward and escorted the professor, Maria, and Shadow out of the room.

"You idiot!" Gerald then shouted as he whipped around to beat on the door. "Do you have any idea what you're going to do? Without Shadow, Maria will never be healed!"

Perfectly seething in his anger, Gerald turned around to face Maria and Shadow. Gerald's guard fell when he saw both of them give him the same emotionless face.

"You are hiding information from us professor." Shadow said in a low voice, speaking a thought both he and Maria were thinking. Gerald frantically looked from Shadow to Maria before letting out a discontented sigh.

"Where do I begin?" Gerald asked as he started to rub his temples in thought.

"The beginning would be pleasant enough." Shadow told him. Gerald looked at the hybrid creature that never should have existed, and gave a nod.

. . .

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. . .

Emotions.

I was always told that our emotions are nothing more than chemicals in our brain.

Once there was a neuroscientist on the ARK that came to study me and work on Project Shadow before Shadow woke up. He once said to me that our brains could be manipulated because of those chemicals. With a single additive chemical introduced to the functioning brain, according to the neuroscientist, someone could be influenced to go on stage when they would have severe stage fright, or they could find themselves attracted to a certain gender or object for no apparent reason.

Imprinting, in other words.

At first, after Grandfather had explained to Shadow and I that we are connected through an invisible link, I didn't really care. That was before Shadow asked an interesting question that I didn't even think of;

Does that mean that his emotions were not his own? Did this mean that he had been manipulated into thinking that he really did have... higher feelings toward me?

Grandfather did not confirm nor deny the idea, and at first, Shadow didn't seem to react. Then, in a speed I wasn't aware he had, Shadow turned around and started to run. I started to go after him, but Grandfather stopped me as he had this really cold look on.

'Let him figure it out' Grandfather told me in a voice I did not recognize. With some defiance, I stopped trying to get out of his grip and stood still.

Shadow didn't need to 'figure it out', he needed a friend.