Sonic x Shadow July 2021 Calendar Story

== Main Story ==
Mission Street, a trendy place for business and shopping, with a full moon in the starry sky. On the rooftop of a store building along the main street, Sonic was looking up at the night sky.
He had come here tonight to watch a little astronomical show.
As usual, Sonic came too early, and to pass the time, he looked down at the bustle of the city… He saw a black hedgehog fighting with something in a back alley. It’s Shadow.
Shadow is one of the most formidable opponents to Sonic in every way.
He is not necessarily evil, but his cold-hearted nature and willingness to use any means necessary to achieve his goals has a dangerous purity that sometimes makes him an enemy of Sonic and the others…
What is Shadow doing in a place like this?
When Sonic, who was suspicious, landed near Shadow…
There were a couple of wrecked Beetle military scouting drones lying around, emitting black smoke and sparks. This is no ordinary thing.
Sonic asks, with a hint of “Did you do this?”
“Hey, Shadow. Are you having fun?”
“It’s nothing to do with you. Don’t get in my way.”
If he answers carelessly, Shadow will disappear into the darkness in an instant… But Sonic isn’t about to lag behind. A high-speed chase ensues through the front and back of Mission Street.
From wall-running to jumping across the roof of a building, to fighting in the air while crossing at high speed in a tunnel… A few moments later, Shadow’s axe kick, delivered at terrifying speed, flashed, and Sonic caught it with both arms.
“(He could stop it…?)”
“(I couldn’t avoid it…)”
After a moment of stiffness, he jumps away and gets some distance, and Shadow speaks up in annoyance.
“Why do you keep following me?”
“I don’t want to be blamed for your misdeeds again.”
“Hah, you’re being self-conscious, aren’t you? I’m busy. If you’ll excuse me, I have to go.”
Shadow parts with Sonic and then pulls out a flickering stone. …A Chaos Emerald.
“Wait! Hold on!”
“Chaos Control!”
For a moment, there is a blinding flash of light…! When the light ceased, Shadow disappeared from the scene.
“Chaos Control”… Shadow’s signature move is using the power of the Chaos Emeralds to warp space.
As expected of Shadow, he was able to do this with the Chaos Emerald, which had used up all of its power in the previous battle and was not at its best. Sonic, left alone, could only look up at the night sky.
“Shadow…”
…A few minutes later.
Behind the main street, Shadow noiselessly broke into an unnaturally large bank building. The wreckage of a newly busted Beetle lay at his feet.
“It’s here. There’s no mistaking it.”
He destroys the armed Beetle that appears from the back, and proceeds to the vault on the second floor, knocking down the guards who return fire. When he reaches the central vault, what he sees in front of the strong door is…
It was Sonic standing there with a grin on his face, flicking the keycard to the vault door in one hand.
He had used the energy detector he had borrowed from Tails before to locate Shadow, and had snuck in through a different route.
The fact that a military-grade Beetle was in the city, that it had been destroyed and hadn’t set off a single alarm, and that it had even opened fire without warning…
Whatever the case, something unusual was going on, Sonic thought.
“So what do you need in exchange for that keycard—
…No, that’s a foolish question. You just want the full picture of this intriguing situation.”
With a short sigh of displeasure, Shadow looked up and began to explain what had happened.
“This place is ostensibly a bank, but that’s a fake… In reality, it’s a weapons laboratory of some sort. They are researching the mysterious power-generating capsules that were seized from the Doctor’s base during the last battle. Even if it’s just a disguise, developing weapons in the city is something to be feared.”
As he says all this, he continues, taking slow steps.
“I was informed that this capsule was a time bomb in disguise, and that it would explode at 24:00 today. It’s supposed to be powerful enough to wipe out half the city. I told them, but they didn’t believe me. That’s why I’m here. What about you?”
Shadow stopped in front of Sonic and gave him a challenging look. A pause of several seconds passes.
“I don’t even know what to say.”
It was all too sudden. Just as Sonic was wondering how to answer, that energy detector detected an unusually high energy reading and sounded an alert… The reading is in the vault.
“…I’m going to trust Tails’s mech.”
Looking over at Shadow with a grin, Sonic put the keycard through the card reader on the door. The heavy metallic sound of clanking could be heard from inside the door.
And at that moment, Shadow put his hand on the door knob with an indifferent expression.
*Bang!*
The door opened from the inside, and a large group of researchers rushed out, looking frantic.
“Run!” “It’s gonna blow up!”
People were running for cover, and the emergency sirens echoed throughout the facility. The whole area was in an uproar.
When Sonic and Shadow leapt inside, they found that it was much larger than they had expected, and at the back of the room, on a lab bench, they could see a capsule-shaped glass body about one meter in diameter and two meters long, protected by an electromagnetic barrier, emitting an intense light.
And then… In spite of this, a large number of guard Beetles were stationed in the room, and they spotted the two intruders and attacked them.
“Man, they’ve got some serious work ethic… Shadow, get the bomb!”
“…!”
Sonic clears away the three bots in front of him in a flash. Shadow runs furiously out of the blast. The electromagnetic barrier, which emits electric shocks when it detects approach… disappears just before Shadow touches it. In this split second, Sonic found the barrier’s generator and destroyed it. And then…
“Chaos Control!”
A ring of light overflows from Shadow’s Chaos Emerald and covers the area. And when it disappeared… The bomb was gone. A few seconds later…
A huge explosion occurs far above Mission Street.
A huge fireball, as if another moon had formed. A roar followed, caressing the surface of the earth. Sonic saw it while jumping out of the window, and gave a thumbs-up in delight.
On the other hand, Shadow, who was already outside with Chaos Control, was watching this with a frustrated expression. In fact, he wanted to fly it into space. But this is as far as the malfunctioning Chaos Emerald could go.
Shadow releases the Chaos Emerald and gives it to Sonic.
“Shadow…?”
“I don’t need anything less than a fake. If I give it to someone good-natured like you, you’ll resurrect it or something, won’t you?”
Sonic replied with a stunned expression as he accepted the Chaos Emerald with one hand.
“…I was going to say thank you, but I decided not to.”
“Why do you keep following me?”
Shadow, walking down a deserted back lane off Mission Street, asks Sonic, who follows him with a grin on his face, without looking back. Sonic, too, puts his hands behind his head, glances up into the night sky, and asks him back.
“I’m the one who wants to know why. Since when did you become the guy who secretly works for everyone’s peace?”
“…I am not interested in peace. I don’t care what happens to others.
I just don’t like it when foolish beings do whatever they please on this planet. Whether it’s the Doctor or anyone else, including you. Don’t misunderstand me.”
…A few seconds of silence followed. Shadow is pouting, and Sonic is still grinning.
“OK. Gotcha. I’ll try to be careful. But I think there are a lot of people who would like to thank you for what you did today.”
“That’s trivial…”
When Shadow finally stopped in his tracks, he turned back to Sonic to tell him to shut up, and…
“…?!”
There, with the distant lights of the city in the background, was Sonic standing with his right arm outstretched, looking towards Shadow and pointing towards the night sky, and a shining full moon at the point he was pointing towards… they could also see the Space Colony ARK floating just above it, looking down at them.
In the midst of the transcendental scene, Shadow had his breath taken away at the sight of the ARK, which looked short of divine in the moonlight below.
The ark of hope and mistakes. This is the place where Shadow was once born, where he gained and lost so much of his precious things and time. A ruin floating in the vacuum, where too many things were given up to protect this planet…
Shadow looks up at the ARK in silence.
“This is absurd!”
As he snapped, Shadow straddled a motorcycle that was behind a thicket on the side of the road. It is a big military motorcycle. It must have been prepared here in advance.
The engine roared as if to reject Sonic’s attempts to say something…
“…The second one’s excessive.”
He drives off at full throttle. Sonic, seeing him off without chasing him, had his usual grin on his face, but he also looked somewhat disappointed.
Mission Street, a trendy place for business and shopping, with a full moon in the starry sky.
== Bottom Description ==
A Rare Relationship that can Enter One's Heart
Shadow is an ultimate life form with formidable power and speed, created by Dr. Eggman’s grandfather, Professor Gerald.
He’s a black hedgehog that looks exactly like Sonic. However, the only similarity is in their silhouettes. Their personalities and tendencies are completely different.
The first game that the two met was Sonic Adventure 2. There was a heated battle between Shadow, who appeared from the past as the enforcer of revenge against the world, and Sonic and his friends, who were trying to stop him. “Chaos Control” also came from this title.
They both clashed with each other in fierce opposition over the emergence of a rival who might be more than an equal, and in the end, they reached a point where they at least recognized each other’s abilities. …Of course, they would never admit that to each other.
Shadow’s story in Sonic Adventure 2 is a journey to discover the true reason why he was created. This is in stark contrast to Sonic, who has been living his life freely, following his heart’s desire, without thinking about anything too difficult.
On the other hand, as Shadow continues his adventures in Sonic Heroes, Shadow the Hedgehog, and Sonic the Hedgehog (2006), it seems that he is facing up to the shackles of his past, such as ties, fate, and memories, and is reaching a point where he can “do as his heart desires” in his own way… or at least, it looks like it.
However, the situation that Shadow is trying to reach from the dark depths of his struggle is completely different from Sonic’s in both history and quality.
Now, what is the existence of Shadow in relation to Sonic and Sonic in relation to Shadow?
If there is one thing that can be said about them, it is that they are the rare ones who can get up close and personal with each other.
Because of the high performance of both Sonic and Shadow, both physically and in their thinking, not many can keep up with them.
Fewer still are the ones who, despite their rejection, are able to persist, to offer opinions, to meddle, or to stand in their way and try to stop them.
In a sense, his kind of presence is troublesome, but it is also one of the most important ones.
However, while Sonic is receptive to hearing things that strike a little close to home, from Shadow’s point of view, Sonic must be a real pain…
From now on, Sonic and Shadow will continue to be active as their “hearts desire,” bumping into each other every time they meet, passing each other, and sometimes even dividing into friend and frenemy.
We hope you will continue to enjoy the tense interactions between them!
== Credit==
Most of this translation of the Sonic x Shadow July 2021 Calendar Story comes from Windii. To support them and see more of their other translations, please visit here. To see where the original translation came from, visit here.
To see the story from where it originally was shown by Sonic Team in Japanese, visit here.
==Trivia==
*In this story, Sonic points out to Shadow that he is the moon. (For the ending of the story, it's alluding that Sonic is watching over Shadow forever and ever, hence the moon in quotes in the original story format. ) This symbolism carries on in other media in the past (except for Classic Sonic), present and future, such as in the Sonic Pic of Shadow gazing at moon (which symbolizes that Shadow is gazing at Sonic). You can see this image from Sonic Team Japan or Sonic America or on Sonic Team Japan's website Sonic Channel. (You can read more about this topic here: Sonic and Shadow - The Moon and The World)
*The story was released in July, the month of Tanabata. The festival celebrates the once a year meeting of the separation of two lovers, much like how in the story, the ARK and the moon meet every once in a while. There is also a bridge at Mission Street, which also reflects the bridge in the story of Tanabata.
*When Sonic pointed at the ARK and moon, then to himself, Sonic could have been alluding with his smirk that while Shadow is looking at the ARK, he could be thinking about him and all the memories they made together there. Sonic assumed this after seeing Shadow look up at the ARK in silence as if remembering the past events that happened there. When Shadow realizes what Sonic meant or that Sonic realized he was thinking of him, he gets flustered and says that the situation is absurd in embarrassment, which is further behavior of a Tsundere. This further cements that this could be the case when the story alludes that no one would know what Shadow is thinking of while looking at the ARK except for Sonic, who was there with him at the time on the ARK.
*It states that this astronomical show was Sonic's favorite. In this story, the Moon represents Sonic and the ARK, in this story, Shadow. This symbolizes that the times that Sonic meets up with Shadow, are Sonic's favorite: Overall, this story also symbolizes that Sonic wishes to be with Shadow. Even if the two can take care of themselves, he finds the moments when they are together, warm. This is further evident when Sonic is disappointed at the end of story when Shadow drives away. All Sonic wants is to be by Shadow's side, much like how they trusted each other and fought together at the end of Sonic Adventure 2.
*When explaining the relationship between Sonic and Shadow in the bottom description after the story, the title of the section is called: (In Japanese: 懐に入って来られる稀有（けう）な関係) In Japanese, the term "懐" (futoko) refers to the heart or inner most feelings of a person. It represents a sense of trust and intimacy. Along with this, the word "懐" can also be used to describe a pocket used when wearing kimonos that holds important valuables such as wallets or other important artifacts. When using this phrase, it can literally mean that someone is entering someone's heart/pocket where important artifacts go. The phrase indicates that someone is entering someone's heart, (In Japanese: 実際、シャドウにここまで深く入って何かを言えて、それが心に届く（届かないことも多いですが）のは、ソニックくらいではないでしょうか。) It also tells how Shadow sees his relationship with Sonic as rare and special on a deep emotional level that is not superficial and that he cares about him despite his Tsundere personality. This can further be seen in the Sonic Pic image of Shadow looking at the moon (Sonic) with fondness that was released later. [The phrase using this term "懐" is not used in any other description of relationship from the 2021 calendar stories, including his friends: Tails, Knuckles and Amy Rose.]
*People often misuse this portion of the story to claim that Shadow doesn't care about humanity or to portray him as mean: However, what they omit is that Shadow is pouting, a clear sign of a Tsundere. A Tsundere may seem cold, but deep down, they truly care and eventually will warm up to the person they like. It is a common Japanese trope. Though it states in Shadow's Japanese profile that he dislikes humanity, he still went out of his way to help others because he is an Anti-hero. Meaning, despite disliking humanity, he also cares about them and goes through the effort to ensure their safety. In Sonic Battle, he states that his desire is to "bring hope to humanity." Eitaro Toyoda even mentions that Shadow is not a bad guy by all means, though not completely good either due to being an Anti-Hero.
*By the way Sonic replies to Shadow when he pouted, he is aware of Shadow's Tsundere personality, but decides not to comment on it and instead, plays along.
*On July 19, 2021, Sonic Team showed the sketch for the 2021 July calendar picture of Sonic and Shadow. In the post, Sonic Team called Sonic and Shadow cute by saying: "Today I'm revealing the rough drawings of 'Sonic & Shadow' in July! At this point, both of them were a little cute~ 🎵 Still they look the same. 😎"
== Story Analyzation ==
In the story, Shadow went to go get rid of a disguised bomb to prevent casualties. He tried to warn the G.U.N. agents about the bomb, but they didn't believe in him and ignored his warnings. But even if they ignored him, he went to go save them and the city the bomb was in anyways. He even tried to get the bomb into space to further prevent any casualties, which is also the reason why he tried to deter Sonic from interfering due to not wanting him to get hurt from the situation as well, but he couldn't get that far when using Chaos Control due to the Emerald being weak in power. No casualties were made because Sonic and him were able to work together to prevent any damages, but Shadow was slightly frustrated at not being able to make sure no casualties were made for certain by taking the bomb and himself into space. Once the city was safe, him and Sonic went walking in the backstreets. It was then that Shadow gave Sonic the Chaos Emerald and said that Sonic, as a good natured person, would heal or fix to Emerald. Here he was trying to imply that Sonic was a good person compared to himself; Shadow was belittling himself despite him coming out of his way on his own time to protect the city from getting annihilated due to the lack of care of others not heeding to his warning. After Shadow pointed out that Sonic was purposely making the effort to follow him, Sonic decided to hit Shadow with words that hit a bit too close to home by teasing Shadow with the question of when he became someone who worked secretly for everyone's peace. Sonic decided to say this to hint to Shadow that he, too, is also a good natured person unlike what Shadow was implying when giving him the Chaos Emerald. Upon hearing this, Shadow paused in a short moment of silence before trying to deny that what he was doing was for a good cause and then ended up pouting from getting found out by Sonic. Sonic realized Shadow's bluff and continued smiling while both were in silence. He then plays along with Shadow's bluff a little by feigning that he believes in Shadow's bluff, but Sonic then adds to push the point further that people would like to thank Shadow for his good deed. Shadow again tries to deny his good deed while realizing that Sonic has caught on to his bluff, but before he could tell Sonic to shut up in embarrassment, Shadow became entranced from seeing Sonic pointing at the ARK above the full moon.
The story then explains that Shadow both gained and lost a lot on the ARK and that it was a place of both hope and mistakes where the place that surrounded it had a lot sacrificed for the protection of the world. The story then goes on to explain that while Shadow is looking at the ARK, no one would know how much Shadow remembers after getting amnesia, but to Sonic, Shadow's silence was his answer. Only Sonic knew what Shadow was thinking while looking at the ARK, which is why he slowly moved his finger from the moon and ARK to himself with a smirk. This was to imply that This would be mainly memories they made together in Sonic Adventure 2 when they saved the world together from the Final Hazard, as it was implied when the story mentions what was sacrificed to protect the world. Upon realizing that Sonic was hinting at their time together at the ARK of them saving the world was another instance showing that Shadow is a good person and possibly at the fact that Sonic wanted them to be together in harmony like the moon and ARK, Shadow blurted out in embarrassment that what Sonic was saying was absurd. Then, to make it so that Sonic doesn't try to push even further that Shadow is a good natured person as well, he goes to his hidden motorcycle and turns on the engine to drown out Sonic's voice or any attempts of Sonic trying to say anything more on the topic. Shadow then in a quiet voice says that the second one is excessive to say to Sonic that like the ARK that is a damaged and ruined entity, he himself is excessive because Sonic being a good and pure person like the moon, is enough; that there doesn't have to be two good natured people. Shadow then quickly drives away as Sonic watches him with his usual grin, but with a hint of disappointment out of Shadow wanting to deny about him being a good person that much and from Shadow feeling unworthy to stay with him like the moon and ARK among the city lights. But even so, the story then goes on to allude that Sonic will continue to watch over Shadow and all his good deeds as he always has, even if others continue to misunderstand and ostracize Shadow.
Category:Japanese Content
Category:Social Medias