(NEW CHAPTER!) Mobius High (Sonic the Hedgehog)

Chapter 2: Back to School!

Dizziness struck Shadow as he began to regain consciousness. He placed his hands beside him and started to lift himself out of ... gravel? Where was he?

He sat up, brushing the tiny rocks off of him as he prepared to observe his surroundings. But before he could fully begin, he hid his shock as he stared at three girls he undoubtedly recognized, except the only different thing about them was that they all wore school uniforms.

His eyes widened as he stared at the one in the centre— Rouge!

He stumbled to his feet, his eyes meeting hers. "Rouge, are . . . are you okay?" He said, his hand reaching forward as if to touch her but respect her boundaries. The two girls beside her—Blaze and Amy—gave him weird looks. Rouge smiled slightly. "I'm sorry, do I know you?" She said politely, her eyes showing that she was being sincere.

The reality of what Rouge said slammed into Shadow like Knuckles' fists in a boxing match. "W-what do you mean? It's me—Shadow. W-what happened to your memory?" He stuttered, somehow unable to recover from the fact that she had no recollection of who he was. He'd considered himself a lone wolf— hedgehog— most of his life, but now that he was truly alone he realized that he genuinely had needed Rouge, and the people who were his . . . well, friends.

A hand smacked into the centre of his back, catching him off-guard. He turned to face the person the hand belonged to, and saw that it was Sonic. Please tell me he remembers who I am, Shadow thought as Sonic opened his mouth. "Hey broski, are you a new student?" Sonic asked cheerily, his hand still on his back between his quills. "S-student?" Shadow stuttered, then made a point to remove Sonic's hand from his back.

"Yeah! This is Mobius High! The best high school in Mobius! Also the only high school in Mobius." Sonic said, a large smile on his face. "Literally everyone in Mobius goes here! Even some adults!" He exclaimed, his blue quills shifting in the slight wind.

Shadow was at a loss for words. When he tried to speak, nothing came out. Sonic roared a laugh at nothing in particular, then put his arm around Shadow's shoulders. "C'mon, I'll show you around the school. Luckily we have exactly an hour to show you around and stuff. How awfully convenient!" Sonic exclaimed, turning to the reader and winking.

"Do you have a schedule?" Sonic asked, getting a little too close to Shadow for comfort. Shadow slipped Sonic's arm off of him, and shook his head. "Oh. Well, we'll go get you one. For some reason you don't have to pay to enrol here or anything, maybe it's because everyone in Mobius attends this school so they're open to everyone, but blah, blah, blah . . ." Sonic continued as Shadow blocked out his words and his eyes swiftly wandered to the large building they were moving towards.

The exterior of the building looked like anything straight out of a slice-of-life anime, and surrounding the building in the school yard were abundant cherry blossom and apple trees.

As he continued to ignore Sonic, he observed the students and saw that everyone from the New Year's party was there. His eyes flicked back to the cherry blossom trees, then narrowed. "What day is it?" Shadow asked, interrupting Sonic's bland rant about who knows what. Sonic stared at him as they entered the building. "Bro, it's the first day of school. You know, the sixth of September?"

Shadow cringed as he thought about the damage that party caused for Mobius. Why was he seemingly the only one who remembered what happened?

Before he knew it, they were at the front office and Sonic had asked the secretary—Vanilla, from the looks of it—to get Shadow a schedule ASAP.

Sonic smiled at him as Shadow placed his hands on the desk. Sonic's hand crept towards his slowly, and eventually rested on top of it. Shadow pulled his hand away immediately, disgusted. "Dude, what the hell?" He yelled, causing Sonic to blush intensely.