Sonic "What if" Scenarios

What if Maria survived Part 1

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.