Chapter 25: Italian Tempered

The time passed slowly and Carla eventually came to accept that the old Doctor was her father and moved to be with him for he was growing old and developing heart problems and the chances of him surviving for another thirty years would be slim.

A loud crash sounded throughout the corridor, "Dad?" green eyes followed the sound to the laboratory where she last saw her father. She paused at the entrance and punched in an access code. When the doors split apart, it exposed a vast trail of shattered glass running along floors and atop the counter space where the once intact lab equipment stood. The intact vials and beakers seemed to have a sort of multicoloured smoke rising from them. She carefully stepped between the areas where glass was not and made her way to the back of the lab.

"Dad! What happened?" she knelt beside the old Doctor and tried to help him sit upright but he moaned in his dreamless sleep from pain. Grasping one of the tweezers still laying on the counter, she gently pried some of the chards of glass out of his skin, "I need to find Shadow or one of the Team…but I don't know if they'll enjoy seeing either of us now after being such a long time."

"Scarlett, can you please stop wiping the windows? You did those less than a week ago! Try wiping the tables instead."

"Beh! Shadow, stop it! I'll get to those in a minute."

"I'll get a rag for you."

"I said in una minuto!"

"Nyah!" he stuck his tongue out at her and tossed a towel toward her, "Catch!"

"Ombra!" surprised by the incoming towel, she caught it midair using her telekinesis, then she gave a glaring glance to the ebony hedgehog.

"Geez, Scarlett. Why're you in such a bad mood today?" he noticed his friend's facial expressions, she seemed to be both calm and fairly upset with him and for the silliest thing! "You keep snapping at me and it's getting out o-" as if on cue, the phone rang, ending his next thought.

"Who's that now, eh?" the Italian trotted up to the phone and picked it up to look at the number. However, she didn't immediately recognise it, "Salve, it's Scarlatto."

"Scarlett!" she began, somewhat anxiously, "It's me, Carla!"

"Ciao! Mia Carla!" Scarlett dropped the towel she was using to clean the table with, "How are you doing piccolo donna?"

"No, no. No time Scarlett. My dad's been injured and he's unresponsive. I need help from you guys."

"Signor Eggman, no?"

"Yes, Scarlatto. My dad."

"I said nothing about him. I'll come by with Shadow within the next fifteen minutes, d'accordo?"

"Yes. I'll see you there."

As Scarlett hung up the phone, Shadow glanced toward her with a worried expression, "That was Carla?"

"Sí, she needs us - something happened to Doctor Eggman."

"What could happened to him? He's the world's evil genius!"

"Shadow! Not funny! Let's go help her and her father."

"Not without me you're not." Sonic stood at the doorway, holding a medical kit and tapping his foot rather impatiently, "Are we going or not?"

"Fine.." he huffed, turning around and pulling out his Chaos Emerald, "CHAOS CONTROL!"

A bright green light flashed through the halls, sending each insect back up into their hiding places. The whole area looked abandoned except for the room at the end of the hall.

"Was the Doctor always like this?" Scarlett looked up to watch a small spider crawl its way up the wall and back onto its web, "I never got to meet him during the fifty years Shadow and I were gone."

"As far as we know, he wasn't always." Sonic paused to turn around to walk backwards, facing both Scarlett and Shadow, "Apparently, the Doctor fell into an emotionally unstable state of mind and never recovered."

"You mean from when I broke our engagement?"

"No. It was something totally different. No one knows what, though, except for Eggy."

"Ah, sí, I understand."

"Guys, we'd better go in and find them. Eggman could be seriously injured."

The soft sounds of voices startled Carla, she recognized them, "Shadow? Scarlett?" she called out.

"It's us, Carla." Sonic opened the door, entered, and stopped beside Eggman, "What happened?"

"I don't know. All I heard was glass shattering and loud noises…I came in here and my dad's completely unconscious."

Upon the sight of the blood nesting itself on the floor, Scarlett immediately felt an impulse to vomit and turned to run out the room.

"Scarlett!" Shadow followed close behind her, "Scarlatto, are you okay?"

"I got sick from the sight of blood."

"Are you feeling nauseaous?"

"Sí." she held her head in her hands.

"Do you want water to drink?"

"No! Shadow, per favore, leave me alone!"

Shadow stepped back, in shock by yet another sudden outburst from his beloved Italian friend, "Scarlett. We'll talk later."

Upon return, Shadow tended to Eggman's wounds as Sonic took in his vital signs, "Everything okay, with Scarlett?"

"Yeah…everything's fine."

Shortly after, the old Doctor was admitted to a nearby hospital where he would be in more professional care. The doctors there learned that he had a heart attack and would be under close supervision for an extended time.

"Keep us updated, okay, Carla?" the blue hedgehog smiled brightly at the girl.

"I will." she smiled partially, "And thank you for helping us out. He would've died if you hadn't helped me – I don't know what to do in such a thing like that."

"No problem, sweetie." he motioned toward the ebony hedgehog and red-headed Italian behind them, "We'd better get going. We've been gone for a while now."

"Okay. See you guys soon!"

"Ciao, Carla."

When they got home, Shadow once again asked what was bothering Scarlett, but he received a snappy answer from her, and immediately, he turned to the Italian and stated firmly, "What is wrong with you today? You've been acting really weird again."

"Shadow, I asked you to leave me alone!" she broke down into tears now, but turned to open a drawer to get a teabag out, "I do not want to be bothered right now!"

"Calm down and stop snapping at me, Scarlett!"

"I am calm!"

"Scarlett, Shadow. Stop! You're both getting irritated with each other and we don't need this." Silver tried talking in a more soothing voice than Shadow's harsher scoldings, "Scarlett, Shadow's right, you are acting off again."

"I'm only tired! I've only had a few hours' sleep." she snatched the towel off the kitchen stove and put on a pot of water to boil.

Sonic poked his head in the doorway, observing the scene: Scarlett seemed to be flustered and upset, Shadow, too, was fairly upset and worried, and Silver was worried and observant of the situation, "Everyone okay in here?"

"Kinda…" Silver whispered to the blue hedgehog, "We'll be okay…"

"No, really, is she okay?" he received no reply and immediately figured that Silver, Shadow, and Scarlett were hiding something.
"Go lie down and rest, okay, Scarlett?" the silver hedgehog gently redirected the Italian toward the kitchen door, "I'll bring your tea when it's ready."

A short time later, Silver and Shadow brought the tea promised to Scarlett. They found her asleep, now…Silver sat on the bed beside her, placing a hand on her side and rubbing her side and back gently.

Sonic soon came up to check on Scarlett as well, "Is everything okay between you guys?"

"Yeah…we don't have any trouble between us…" the ebony counterpart trailed off thinking about why his friend often snapped at times.

"Then why does she always snap at people like this sometimes? It seems like one minute she's fine, then the next she's outta control."

"I know..."

"But why?" he insisted.

He looked up at the blue hedgehog making crimson eyes meet emerald, "She's bipolar." he brushed the girl's bangs out of her face, "Her moods change rapidly and without notice. That's why she's always got that 'Italian temper' as we call it 'cause she's too embarrassed to admit it to anyone else on the ship."

"Oh...I see." the cobalt hedgehog leaned forward, watching Scarlett sleep. There were many things he didn't know about Scarlett and Shadow – and this being one of them, "Has she always been like this, Shadow?"

"Yeah. Ever since we met, she's always had bipolar episodes. It can be...very stressful when she has one like today."

"I see." he motioned for the two to follow him, "Hey, let's go downstairs. Tails has a virtual training mission for us to look at."

Silver set the cup of tea on the desk beside Scarlett's bed, "What about Scarlett?"

"Don't worry, this is just a brief meeting. He'll give us the rest of the details later."

XXX

"Miles, have you got everything ready?" Shadow called out as he strapped his backpack, utility belt, and camouflage uniform on.

"Yeah. I'm loading the virtual reality world now." as he said this, he entered several commands into the computer's database which triggered the development of a world inside the large room in the belly of the Blue Typhoon where Shadow and Scarlett were to go to in a few minutes. This virtual world was indeed virtual, but everything that happened in the world had effects on the participants such as injuries and environmental factors.

"Scarlett, you ready?" Shadow shut his locker as Scarlett finished dressing.

From behind her locker door, she pulled her undershirt over her, then her camouflage uniform like Shadow's, "In a moment. I'm almost ready, Shadow."

"Hurry up slow pokey!" he looked around the locker door.

"Shadow! Stop that!" she turned away from him, putting the rest of her clothes on.

"You're already dressed and it's not like I haven't seen you dress before when we share rooms."

Scarlett pulled her military boots out from the locker, put them on, and tightened them before glancing back up, "Yes, I'm ready."

"Not yet." Tails's voice called over the intercom. As if on cue, a glass door opened to reveal machine guns, handguns, grenades, bows and arrows, knives, and various supplies, "Don't forget to stock up."

"Here." Shadow handed Scarlett a versatile knife, a metal longbow and arrows, and couple different firearm, "I'll just take the guns." he smugged grimly with satisfaction.

The two walked to the airlock and awaited Tails's cue for them to proceed to their mission.

"Rendezvous at your locations at exactly 05:00 hundred hours tomorrow morning. You know what to do from there."

"Confirmed."

"Initiating mission in 3...2...1..."

The doors opened. Within the first thirty metres, the first thing the duo were greeted with, was a military camp filled with rival soldiers.

"When I say go, you go. Understood, Scarlett?"

"Shadow, stop! We don't need to be moving so quickly so soon. We have plenty of time."

"We want to stay ahead of schedule."

"But we're going to wear ourselves out before the mission even begins!"

"Scarlett!"

Scarlett moaned in disgust as she reluctantly complied.

"Good." the ebony hedgehog glanced to his right, "Come on. I promise we'll stop and set up camp shortly before dark."

"Grazie, Ombra. Grazie."

"Prego, mia Scarlatto." he held out his hand to her, "Now let's get going. We need to make up for lost time."

"D'accordo..." she pulled out of her arrows, gently grazing her finger over the sharp blades, "You ready?"

He nodded, "Ready..." he studied the soldiers' movements carefully before continuing, "Now! Move, Scarlett! Move!" Shadow pushed Scarlett ahead of him as they ran into the jungle environment toward the camp, taking aim.

The next sound heard was the reverberating sound of a rifle being shot.

Fine

~XxXOoOXxX~

A/N:

I'm sorry to say this story has come to a close :'( As much as I would enjoy continuing it, I cannot. I have other stories in the works! As I have taken a fairly long hiatus, it is time I come back ;D I have been working a little on my next story 'A Scarlett Shadow,' which details the lives of Scarlett and Shadow aboard ARK, particularly giving insight of Scarlett's shadowy backstory, as well as Shadow's. I know Scarlett was somewhat thrown into my series without a background and she deserves to have one well-written as I've noticed many of you have taken a liking to her. I will also be maturing my stories, so some content will be much more older teen oriented. I will still be writing stories for early teens, so not to worry.

~Andi Rose