An Extraordinary Girl

"Come on, you useless dolts! Help me think of something!" Eggman irritably snapped at Orbot and Cubot. He had retreated to his lair after Dawn had escaped his attack. "I need to come up with something tougher for Sonic's brat to face."

As Eggman and his two little lackeys tried to find a usable strategy, there came a knock from the lair's entrance. Cubot went to answer it, and Charlie entered the control room, not looking very happy. Eggman, however, was quite pleased to see a fellow villain.

"Oh, hey, Charlie! What brings you here?"

"Have you met Sonic's daughter recently?" Charlie asked, getting straight to the point.

This broke Eggman's friendly approach; he became as equally mad and annoyed as his visitor. "Is that why you're here? That little snot give you trouble, too?"

"Yeah. What's say we find a way to take her down for good this time?"

"Best offer I've heard all day." Eggman went back to his thinking state. "The thing is, I'm having trouble coming up with something I can use against her."

"What have you used so far?" Charlie asked.

"I tried attacking her with a lot of small robots-you know, give her multiple targets-but that completely failed."

"If attacking her with several small enemies didn't work....."

Eggman and Charlie came to the conclusion at the same time, "then we try using one big enemy!"

"Charlie, I think you might be as much of a genius as me." Eggman complimented. "Now let's get to work!"

Dawn used her spikes to cut the hanging greenery that got in her and Shadow's way. The hedgehog had teleported them to the bottom of the waterfall-at which they found the broken remains of their boat-and they were now walking through the pit at the bottom, looking for anything note-worthy, albiet mostly because Dawn was curious. Shadow noticed how much she seemed to enjoy searching and exploring, and he wondered which parent she inherited the trait from, or if it was hers entirely.

"So, Dawn," Shadow attempted to start a conversation, "how long have you dreamt of this journey?"

"For as long as I can remember." Dawn replied. "I grew up seeing my parents and friends take on the villains who threatened the village, and how much they were loved and admired by the villagers. And at some point, I knew I wanted to be just like them. So I prepared for this journey day and night for years."

"And given what I've seen you accomplish so far, it looks like all that preparation payed off."

"I'll say it has." Dawn looked around at the nature-adorned surroundings, poorly lit due to being so far below, away from the sun. "Hmm, doesn't look like we'll find anything worth checking out down here. Guess we can continue on down here until we reac-"

Dawn's voice trailed off when her ears picked up a distant rumbling sound, which seemed to be slowly getting louder. "Do you hear that, Shadow?"

"I do." Shadow entered a battle stance. "We should prepare to fight, it could be trouble."

Dawn nodded in agreement and stood back-to-back with her companion, ready for battle. As the rumbling grew louder, it brought with it a slight tremor, which was growing stronger as it came closer. It occured to Dawn that it was probably an earthquake, but as she was about to share the thought with Shadow, the nearby trees were flattened as the threat presented itself to the pair.

It was a massive robot with large, heavy arms, a rolling platform for legs, and a giant canon on top that resembled an eye, which focused on Dawn and Shadow. Something flew up next to the robot-Eggman on the Eggmobile, now accompanied by Charlie.

"Eggman! You again?!" Dawn exclaimed.

"Hello again, Dawn." Eggman's fake friendly demeanor changed when he saw Dawn's companion. "Huh? Sh-Shadow?! What are you doing with her?!"

"I'm ensuring that she doesn't get hurt during her journey. You and your robot are a threat to her safety, therefore you must be taken down."

Eggman didn't want to attack Shadow, as he saw the hedgehog as a useful ally against Team Sonic-even though he had merely used and failed Shadow more than once-but Charlie persisted. "She's right there and so is the robot, let's take her out now!"

Eggman groaned. "Fine." He pointed at Dawn as he commanded the robot, "Get her!"

The robot lunged forward and attempted to crush Dawn with its giant hands, but Dawn sped out of the way. Shadow joined her as she raced in circles around the robot, creating barely visible trails of purple and red as the giant mech blindly attacked and fired its laser. Not once did it manage to hit either of them.

Eventually, the exertion depleted the robot of its power, and it slumped over, no longer attacking the pair. Dawn unraveled the enerbeam she  had brought with her and wrapped the glowing purple energy whip around the robot. Shadow held it in place as she jumped up and uppercutted its canon head off.

Charlie looked about to throw a temper tantrum. "Oh, come on! I thought we had her this time!"

"She only won because she had help from Shadow." Eggman grumbled.

"Still making excuses, Egghead?" Dawn asked, further angering the evil doctor.

"We'll be back, Dawn! And we'll have something even tougher for you to face, so tough that you won't win even with Shadow! Just you wait!" The villains flew off.

"Well done, Dawn." Shadow said. "I must admit, being with you on this journey is teaching me many things. The importance of teamwork, for example. I always took teamwork as a sign of weakness, but I see now that I was wrong."

"Having allies doesn't mean you're weak. It just means you have people you can count on to help you, to be there for you when you need them." Dawn looked up at the sky. "Sometimes your allies become your close friends, almost like family. They're not your weakness, they're your strength. That's what Mom told me, a long time ago."

Shadow knew Sonic as well as Dawn did, and he knew that it was an important and valuable message for him to give his daughter, even if it went against what he used to believe. He placed a hand on Dawn's arm and even gave her a small smile, which was very rare for him to do.

"Dawn, this isn't something I normally say about your mother, but you have a wonderful family. For them to be giving you such important lessons to live by, they've done an excellent job raising you. Remember that."

Dawn smiled back and nodded. "I will, Shadow. Always."

As he looked at her smiling face, Shadow felt a warmness he hadn't felt before. He liked Dawn, geniuenly liked her. Despite knowing who her mother was, she amazed him every step of their journey, and continued to do so.

She was perhaps the most extraordinary girl he had ever met.