…I haven't updated since December. That's…pretty sad. I'll admit that I've been busy, but man, I've been procrastinating like hell. I'm so sorry guys…I'll try not to do this again, 'kay?

Anyway, with the Christmas chapter…pretend that either I already finished it, or that it will be updated soon. I'll probably add part 2 in next Christmas, and then we'll all be happy. For now, onto the new chapter!

Oh yeah, disclaimer…Shadow and all related peeps belong to Sega. I do not own Playstation 3's (though I have one at home), trucks, cow bombs, or corn fields. However, I do own Gemini, Ciel, Miffskin, and for this chapter, a gang of hillbilly farmer-bunnies.

Personally, Shadow was glad that the months passed so quickly. December went by with its usual holiday slowness, January flew by since nothing really went for it, and February…well, the Ultimate Lifeform had done a pretty good job of locking himself inside for Valentines Day, and minimal mushiness on his part (Save for the hordes of creepy fanletters for him, and even a few for his siblings. All letters were appreciated…as fire fuel.)

Well, February was already over. All that March had going for it was St. Patrick's Day, and that was just a day to wear green and drink scotch and such. After that was April, which had diddley squat, and now May. So, how bad could things be?

Horrendous, as a matter of fact. This was because the rent was due in one week…and there wasn't enough money to pay the rent this month.

"What do you mean, we don't have enough money?" Shadow shouted. "I thought we did, even with me not having any money from Rouge's thieving routines right now!"

"Not our fault you can't pay your part of the rent," Gemini chided, actually paying attention instead of staring at his games. "And me…well, let's just say that our usual hijinks has distracted me from my work enough, so I got…laid off, let's say. That's why I don't have any money."

Shadow sighed, not too happy with how the conversation was going. "…Ciel? How about you?"

"Well," the winged hedgie replied, "Usually, I take pockets, and I sometimes find money and wallets in them…but I haven't gotten much recently."

"You mean you pick pockets?"

"Yeah, I pick the pockets off!" In fact, in Ciel's closet was filled with pockets that he (well, Paranoia) had ripped off of random people he met. Or attacked. Or both!

Of course, this meant that neither of them really had money. It was useless to ask if Miffskin had money either, since she would rather eat money instead of anything else. In fact, in Ciel's collection of pockets and wallets, she had actually eaten all of the credit cards already, leaving them as a lump of mush under the couch. This, of course, meant that they were broke.

So, Shadow paced around the room, thinking. What could they do to possibly get some money? There weren't a lot of people willing to hire a 'crazed' Ultimate Lifeform, a lazy magician, or a childish freak with wings and his pet alien. Most of the ads in the paper were for humans anyway, since Station Square had more humans than anything else. What then?

Unfortunately, Shadow remembered his last-ditch option. It was the one he hated relying on the most, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Grabbing the phone, he dialed a number from memory.

"Hello, GUN military? Agent Shadow here…I was wondering if there are any high-reward assignments available…"

A few hours later, the three hedgies were assigned to their mission. It was of the utmost importance, having the potential to destroy the world in the wrong hands…so the officer said.

Despite this, it was in the back of a semi-truck, out in the middle of Nowhere, Illinois. As the name implies, there wasn't much there to begin with, save for infinite rows of corn fields. Now, picture a lonely highway, with a semi with content capable of destroying the world, and three half-sane hedgehogs.

Shadow was behind the wheel, and despite the urgency of the mission, was bored out of his mind. There was nothing exciting about this! No high-speed chases, no villains, and an annoying speed limit of 25 miles per hour. So, he sat there, barely touching the gas pedal as they went along.

Gemini was in the passenger seat, equally bored. Since they had been called out with no preparation, he had sadly left any and all game systems at home. Trying to find something to keep his mind from going dead, the mage was attempting at playing a game in his head. This didn't work, however; with so much corn about, the mind-game was basically various characters attacking corn-mutated bosses.

At least Ciel was having fun. He was flying overhead for surveillance. Seeing how his pet black wing had never been to the countryside before (and neither had he, for that matter), the winged hedgie was attempting to teach her what was what.

"And that down there Miffy," he concluded, "is more corn! Say it with me now; c-o-r-n."

"Mee-eee-meepem-meep," replied the bored little alien.

"Good girl! Now…hmm, let's see…oh, a cow! See, that's a cow! Say hi to the cow, Miffskin!"

By now, you get the gist of it. What was really needed was something exciting, something exhilarating, and something the author could actually write about without putting the readers to sleep. In an attempt to find something, Shadow began pilfering through the truck. He happened upon a small card with a man's face on it. It dawned upon him that this was someone's driver's license. Hmm…driver's license…

"I've got it!" For seemingly no apparent reason, the Ultimate Lifeform suddenly floored the brakes, bringing the vehicle to a sudden halt (and mowing over a few innocent stalks of corn). He then hopped out of the car, sauntered in front, and went back in through the passenger seat, where Gemini was.

"You're driving," he told his brother, pushing the mage into the driver's seat.

"What?"

"I'm going to teach you how to drive," Shadow stated simply. "It's one of those essential things to know nowadays. Also, what can be manlier than cars? Especially giant trucks like this!"

"I dunno…" Gemini muttered, fidgeting with his sunglasses. "What if my idea of manliness is mastering video games and complex magic skills?"

"Then you have sucky ideas. I'm teaching you how to drive, so just deal with it." With a look that could only be described as mischievous evilness, Shadow turned on the ignition of the car, and leaned back in his seat. "Now, you use this to steer…and this to go…and this stops."

"Do I need to pay attention to any of these dials and meters?" Gemini definitely did not want to drive; he had never been one for racing games or anything. He especially didn't want his first experience to be with a freaking truck, carrying potentially doomsday-causing cargo, and with Shadow as his tutor in the middle of nowhere. The only thing that could make this worse would to have cameramen to document this, and for Ciel to start singing. Then again, Ciel's singing could ruin anything, so that didn't really count for much.

Shadow shook his head. "Nah, just the gas. Maybe the speed limit if there's cops around." Not like Gemini knew which ones were which, of course. "What are we waiting for? Get going!" The mage stared dubiously at the pedals, shrugged, and then floored the gas. The truck shot off like a rocket, kicking dust and corn kernels up into Ciel and Miffskin's faces.

"They left without us!" The former shouted. "You know what this means?"

"Meep meeper?"

"…No, we don't devour their heads yet, silly. Come on, let's follow them. Say goodbye to the cow now."

"…meep…" The duo flew off after the speeding car, not noticing that they were being watched.

Not too far away, there was a small farmhouse of rabbits. Hillbilly rabbits, mind you. They farmed and built, and in their spare time, sat around on the porch with weapons loaded. Their only claim to fame had been winning the lottery, which had been used to buy all the nearby land for corn fields. At this precise moment, one of the younger rabbits ran up to the main farm, where the adults were at work.

"Pa! Pa!! There's anoth'r giant truck a'speedin down the road. It'sa goin' over the speed limit!" Pa Rabbit perked his ears up.

"Dang nabbit! I put those signs up fer a good reas'n! Git the guns boys; we'va got us some varmins ta shoot!" There was a loud holler amongst the various rabbits, as they all went to grab their weapons of choice.

For now, a certain red-streaked hedgehog decided, the driving lesson was a success. Sure, Gemini was trembling like a leaf, and the speedometer had broken, but Shadow did that all the time, so it was no big deal to him. The rearview mirror showed that the cargo was still safe, and Ciel (with Miffskin) had caught up with them finally. The winged hedgie and his pet were now sitting on top of the truck, the former still naming the various country residents.

"Hey looky, farmers! They look like rabbits!" Ciel paused. "Say, why do they have guns and funny hats? Shadow, I think they're aiming at us."

"Yeah right."

"They're about to shoot us!"

"Yeah right."

BAAAANG!!

"…They shot us."

There was now a giant barrage of holes on the door of the truck. Staring in disbelief, Shadow shook his head, pulling out a classic sniper rifle.

"Someone's just signed a death wish," He muttered. "Gemini, keep driving, no matter what happens."

"What if the truck's about to blow up?"

"Keep driving." Without another word, the Ultimate Lifeform warped on top of the speeding truck. He aimed out at the vast corn fields, and fired, hitting one rabbit straight in the forehead. Oddly enough, there was no blood or explosion.

"The hell?" Shadow checked the gun's ammo, and noticed that instead of bullets, there were corn kernels.

"The author decided that it'd be too gory if you shot all the rabbits and killed them," Ciel explained. "That, and Miffy ate all the bullets. So I figured that there was enough corn, and you could use that!"

"…You are all so dead." Leveling the rifle again, Shadow fired at the farmer bunnies with deadly accuracy, and they fell like flies. But when one fell, twenty more rose up! (Not that you could tell; seeing as they all looked the same, there was probably some inbreeding going on) What could be done? How could those darn rabbits be stopped?

"Those varmins are gittin' away!" Pa Rabbit shouted. "Grab the catapult!" A horde of rabbits dragged out a giant wooden catapult into the fields. "Ready the amm'nition!" A cow (and a rabbit who had been sitting on the catapult, and was unknowingly squashed by aforementioned cow) was strapped to the catapult.

"Shadow," Ciel piped up, "I didn't know that cows were used as bombs."

"They aren't." The angst-hog refilled his rifle with corn, a grave expression on his face. "Looks like we'll have to shoot that thing out of the sky, or the mission's failed. This is our last stand! Ciel, are you ready?"

The winged hedgehog shrugged. "Ready for what?"

"I don't know! To defend this truck from complete and utter destruction?"

"…Sure!"

"Fire in the hole!" The cow (and rabbit) was hurled into the air, flying through the sky like Superman. Shadow aimed his rifle, trigger finger ready. Ciel stood there, an amazed expression on his face. Miffskin was floating next to Ciel, wondering why the cow was so bad at flying in the first place.

Suddenly, the truck slowed to a halt. The cow, which had been aimed a few feet ahead, slammed ineffectively into the ground, with only the rabbit as padding.

Shadow stood there, at first not sure what had happened. A proud expression crept onto his face, and he glanced down at the driver.

"Perfect timing, Gemini! You stopped us from being cow-bombed!"

"Actually," Gemini said, "I think we ran out of gas. I'm pretty sure that was the dial that broke last." He pointed to a smoking dashboard, and mentally promised himself to never drive again.

"Oh," Shadow said, now a tad disappointed. "Well then…Chaos Control!" Within a few seconds, the truck and cargo flashed into the nearest Wal-Mart, which was their original destination. It occurred to the siblings that they could have done this in the first place, but they quickly shrugged it off. All that was needed now was to unpack the stuff. Running to the back, the trio wrenched open the carrier. Inside was…

"You have GOT to be kidding me," Shadow groaned. The carrier was filled with boxes of Playstation 3's, and nothing more. Gemini stared slack-jawed at the merchandise as well.

"If I had known that this was the cargo, I would have driven in a heartbeat!" He exclaimed, clambering into the truck and pulling out a box. "These things are so friggin' expensive! Do you know how much I've wanted one of these? They can do anything!"

"Gemini, we really shouldn't take that," Ciel chimed in. "I don't think GUN will like that very much."

"Screw GUN; I have money!"

"That's why we were doing this in the first place," Shadow added. "We didn't have money, so we're doing this stupid mission. So now, we get paid by GUN…"

"Or we could just steal all of these, sell them on EBay, and get tons of moolah!" The mage argued. "Besides, haven't you ever wanted one of these? It can play games, music, movies…"

"Hmm…"

Well, it remained unknown what the siblings did with the playstations. With luck, it will remain unknown. Shadow, however, later returned to the middle of nowhere, and promptly exterminated all the annoying rabbits and corn in the area.

Happy, happy end to the scenario! I know this probably wasn't worth a five month wait, but hey, at least I'm back! This was fun to write…and also, incredibly fun to read out loud. Ever try impersonating hillbilly rabbits?

Anyway, to make sure that we don't have another month-long wait…I'd like suggestions! Have an idea for a funny situation with the Shadow Siblings? Well, tell me in a review or pm! I'd prefer no additional OC's unless absolutely necessary, and nothing M-rated. Other than that, tell me what you'd like to see! You may be lucky, and your idea may spark my interest!

Until I see you again here! If you want to reach me otherwise, you can always find me on deviantArt, remember. I seem to find more time for pictures than my stories, sadly…so drop on by, if you will. X3