In honor of the second live action Sonic moving coming out around the time I post this, I will give the biggest "What if" that lots of people would think of.

"What if Maria didn't die on the Ark like in canon?"

How much would the timeline change if Shadow never went on a mission to avenge Maria's death?

As you can probably guess, everything changes majorly in this What if.

Let's not leave you waiting and get to it.

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50 years ago...

The government had sent soldiers to capture the Ark and take everyone inside, whether dead or alive.

Gerald Robotnik had already been captured alongside several scientists, but their goal wasn't done yet.

They had to capture actual experiment Gerald had been hired to create: Project Shadow.

Shadow had tried to hurry to an escape pod with his close friend and only family Maria Robotnik, dragging her down the halls as armed men chased after them. The hedgehog had done well at shaking them off and getting to their destination, but it was only a matter of time until they caught up again.

Maria got Shadow into his before getting ready to send him down, but a soldier found them and ordered Maria to step away, only to have to fire on her when she launched him anyways.

Shadow was horrified at seeing the one person he cared most about fall to the floor with a fatal wound, trying to smile up at him and begging him to promise that he would give the world a chance to be happy for.

The pod was sent out as Maria's vision faded to black, Shadow being the last life she ever saw.

Where does the timeline change from here?

Conveniently, a soldier that was a trained medic was nearby when the shot went off and hurried in to see one of his squad had shot Maria, quickly getting next to her and working to get the bullet out.

The medic was able to treat the wound enough that Maria could be escorted off the Ark and to an infirmary so doctors could work on healing the girl.

Gerald is later given the news while he's in custody that Maria survived and she will be alright, putting the scientist at ease that his granddaughter didn't become a victim of government coverups.

With Maria making it off the Ark barely alive, Gerald doesn't make a secret revenge plot to destroy the world with Shadow, pretty much removing Bio Lizard as a threat all together.

Unfortunately, Gerald didn't stay safe from the authorities...

...still being executed in private to avoid public knowledge of the experiments.

The government also partially lied to Gerald in his remaining days alive about Maria in order to make sure nothing popped up again later.

While Maria survived now, her health condition labeled as N.I.D.S was worsening now that her body was trying to deal with healing a large bullet wound that possibly broke a bone or two in the process.

In other words, Maria was slowly dying even while on life support.

There was no way they knew they could keep her alive with most of the current technology and medicine today, and Shadow was locked away in stasis, so they couldn't test to see if his blood would help cure her.

Even if she was cured, they couldn't exactly just put her with some random family, because she had seen too much and will definitely try to expose them years later.

To take two birds with one stone, Maria was put into stasis like Shadow, keeping knowledge of her existence and her being locked away indefinitely classified.

But this didn't mean secrets would stay buried forever...

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50 years later...

Like in the original timeline, Eggman finds Shadow in stasis and releases him...

...but his interaction with him is different this time.

Shadow immediately jumps out and is panicking in a search for Maria, desperate to know if she's alright or not.

Eggman tries to take advantage of Shadow's vulnerability and makes up a little tall tale to convince him to be on his side.

In this lie, he claims the government took Maria and held her hostage, eventually dying from depression because Shadow wasn't there with her anymore.

The doctor even adds that Maria hoped Shadow would be there for her cousin, Ivo, and keep him safe for her.

The villain really wants to guilt trip Shadow into helping him, but he didn't want to see what happens if he claimed Maria did indeed die of her wounds to Shadow.

Shadow kind of buys this story anyways because it gives him a false hope that Maria did make it anyways, but she didn't exactly to have her dream that she wanted.

But he still refuses to believe that Maria is dead, wanting to see it for himself before he makes his final conclusion.

The hedgehog escapes the facility and goes rogue, trying to search every zone he came across to find Maria.

Adventure 2 basically becomes a wild battle royale for who can win in the end.

Sonic is basically trying to avoid G.U.N after Shadow causes some accidents that lead to them thinking the blue hedgehog did it.

Tails is helping best he can with Amy, occasionally running into Eggman as both sides are looking for Chaos Emeralds.

Eggman is trying to keep getting Shadow on his side while collecting all 7 emeralds, though his efforts with the hedgehog doesn't bear much.

Shadow is going around dodging G.U.N, Sonic and Eggman, just wanting to know where Maria is like a lost puppy.

Meanwhile, Knuckles and Rouge are trying to see who can get all of the Master Emerald shards before the other.

It finally all comes to a head when Sonic and Shadow finally have a big confrontation in Station Square.

After a big fight between the two, Sonic finally wins and demands Shadow tell him what he wants.

Shadow finally gives in after being stubborn for most of their encounters and tells him he was looking for Maria, wanting to know where his only family is.

Sonic realizes something bigger than Eggman was at play here, and Shadow needed his help more than ever.

The Blue Blur offers to help the Ultimate Lifeform find Maria, telling him that he's more concerned about getting them together then settling a score with Eggman.

After regrouping with Tails, they soon encounter Rouge, who gives them some data she snagged off of Eggman while he wasn't looking.

From this, Shadow learns where Maria has been held for 50 years and hurries with Sonic to break her free.

Tails finds out Shadow's blood plus a enough Chaos energy could reverse the damage done to Maria's body and even cure her of her disease, which the fox works hard in the next three hours to perfect the cure and give it to the girl.

It works! Maria would get to live a long and healthy life on Earth now.

It's a heartwarming reunion between the hedgehog and the girl as they embrace while Sonic and Tails watch from the sidelines.

Shadow would like to start living peacefully with Maria, but he knows there are a few problems he may still have to deal with in the next few months.

First off, Maria's cousin, Eggman, was gathering the Chaos Emeralds and might use the Eclipse Cannon to threaten the world.

Secondly, the government may still try to deal with them since they're the only survivors of the raid, so they need to get them off their back.

And lastly, the Black Arms would be coming eventually, and he needed to be ready to take him down too.

Shadow offers to stop Eggman himself for Sonic and bring him into custody to stop his plans.

He just asks for Sonic and Tails to expose or blackmail information regarding the Ark Incident so the government would leave him and Maria alone.

Sonic excepts the challenge from Shadow and wishes him good luck on stopping the evil doctor.

The grand finale is basically three different major fights.

The first being Knuckles and Rouge finishing their rivalry over the Master Emerald with Knuckles saving Rouge at the end and getting all of the pieces back.

The second is Sonic and Tails facing off against G.U.N to get to the data where they can upload it everywhere.

The duo almost upload completely, but the commander finally gives up and promises to leave Shadow and Maria alone if they don't expose the truth.

Tails decided to keep the intel somewhere safe in case G.U.N needs to be put in their place again.

The final fight is Shadow against Eggman on the Space Colony Ark.

Eggman is completely shocked his grandfather's creation would turn against him, but he still fights anyways.

The fight goes about as expected, with Shadow dominating and demolishing Eggman before dragging him off to face prison time.

With the action over for now, Shadow thanks Sonic for his help and promises to repay the favor to the hero one day.

Shadow and Maria get a home out in a beautiful meadow and live peacefully together, though Shadow does still train himself to prepare for the Black Arms.

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Things that change in Sonic Heroes

-Shadow is absent for this

-Rouge doesn't bother searching Eggman's bases for jewels

-Omega gets brought in to fight the heroes, only to be destroyed by them

-Metal doesn't get to copy Team Dark's data, meaning Metal Overlord is much weaker than he was in canon

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Shadow the Hedgehog

As funny as this sounds, the adventure is actually short here, despite all the build up Shadow does prior to the Black Arms invasion.

Shadow didn't forget who he was in this timeline and knows exactly who Black Doom is, not letting the alien get the drop on him.

Combine that with Shadow having all of the heroes as his allies and G.U.N soldiers taking on all of the Black Arms soldiers, then Shadow can basically just take Black Doom down without too much trouble.

After a team up of Super Sonic and Super Shadow, Black Doom is obliterated and Shadow teleports the Black Comet to the Eclipse Cannon to be blown up by it.

With all of this out of the way, Shadow could finally settle down and rest knowing that him and Maria could enjoy their lives.

Unfortunately, there's more threats on the horizon that may even require Maria's help.

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In Part 2, we will try to cover how Sonic 06 goes with Maria alive

See you guys later!