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Sonic ate lunch at Meh Burger, alone and bored out of his mind. Absolutely nothing interesting was going on that day. Well, Sticks and Amy seemed to be up to something, but whatever it was, the guys weren't invited. Tails was working in his lab, and Knuckles was off... lifting weights, probably. Eggman hadn't even attacked the village yet. What a snoozefest.
With one last bite, Sonic concluded that his burger wasn't even bad enough to justify complaining to Dave the Intern, either. Lame.
"I need something to do," Sonic whined, "but with who?"
"Actually, it's with whom."
Sonic glared at the intruder. "Well, it's not gonna be with you."
The beaver (what was his name, anyway?) frowned and retreated, but didn't say anything. Good. Know your place, you semiaquatic rodent.
Sonic waited a moment.
Dang. He really wasn't even going to argue. Even though Sonic was soooooooo bored. How long did he have to wait until the plot got moving? Something had to happen eventually. It always did.
An hour of painstaking waiting later, something happened. A red blur zoomed by. "Finally," Sonic grumbled under his breath as he got up and began running after him. A good race was exactly what he needed. "Yo, Shadow!" he called out, knowing full well that Shadow wouldn't hear a word he said. That was probably the only disadvantage to running at supersonic speeds. Whatever. He'd catch up with Shadow soon. No way he'd let Shadow outrun him.
Thwop.
Huh. A distraction. Sonic braked to a stop immediately. What's that... thing?
As soon as he stopped, Shadow sped out of sight, leaving only a mysterious object in his wake. Sonic picked it up. "Hey, you dropped this!" He waited about five seconds before deciding Shadow had had his chance. Time to investigate! This thing was clearly a book... Shadow never seemed much for reading, but maybe that was just because he was always busy fighting. Sonic turned the book over to reveal the front cover. It was light pink, with a single gold embossed word: "DIARY". But that word had been scribbled over with marker, and underneath was the word "JOURNAL" in a harsh scrawl.
Sonic snorted. Loudly. "Did somebody give this to him as a joke?" He flipped through the pages vaguely. "Huh... He sure isn't treating it like a joke."
Page after page was filled with writing. For a second, Sonic worried he was too good a person to actually read Shadow's private thoughts, then he laughed. "Yeah, right." He read a page at random, then another, then another. Most of it was kind of boring, really, until he read a certain paragraph. His jaw dropped open, and he had to reread it two times.
"Not a single living soul can know that I have feelings, no matter how mild, for that obnoxious blue hedgehog. Ever."
Sonic wondered if he was interpreting it wrong. That's gotta be it, right? But his eyes slid down to see a doodle of himself, encased by a heart.
Huh.
Hmm.
Sonic burst out laughing. Shadow, really? Of all people? Oh, man. Shadow would never live this down. Sonic would rub this in his face, every time he saw him. And maybe enjoy a bit of adoration from Shadow. His rival was, really, pretty cool. Having someone so cool fawn over him might be fun. A date or two might not be so bad, either. On Shadow's wallet, of course. Since Shadow liked him.
A loud, zooming sound effect alerted Sonic to Shadow's rapid approach. He barely had a second to straighten up and close the book before Shadow appeared in front of him, looking even more displeased than usual. He glared at the book in Sonic's hands, then at Sonic himself. Wow, if looks could kill.
Heh. Time to get his flirt on.
"So, Shadow," Sonic tossed the diary over to Shadow, "you like me, huh? Yeah, not a surprise. Everyone does."
The beatdown that happened next was much more violent than normal. Really not the kind of thing that could be aired on TV. But it resulted in Sonic, barely conscious in the middle of a field somewhere. His head hurt. His arms hurt. His... everything hurt.
Shadow, apparently, didn't know much about flirting.
"Hey!" An indignant voice broke Sonic out of his pain. Dr. Eggman hovered above him in his Eggmobile, looking furious. "What's this? I haven't even attacked you yet! Hey, are you fighting someone else behind my back?" His face fell.
Sonic groaned. "Ugh... It's not going to be a regular thing."
"It better not be. I thought we had something special." Eggman's eyes shone passionately. "Well, who did this to you, anyway? I'd like to bring them onto the team.”
“...Shadow. For entirely no reason, too. Just completely unprovoked.”
Eggman squealed girlishly, making Sonic’s head pound even harder.
“Ugh. What is it?”
“You don’t get it!” Eggman clapped his hands excitedly. “If Shadow attacked you for no reason, then that means he’s...”
“A jerk?”
“A villain! He’s a villain! He isn’t just some complex, morally gray antihero with a tragic backstory and a fierce rivalry! He’s a true blue villain. Finally...” He squealed again as he waved his hands in the air. “This is the greatest day of my life! I don’t even want to destroy you anymore. I have to make plans. Plans with Shadow!”
Eggman flew away before Sonic could even think to say that maybe it wasn’t entirely unprovoked. Whatever. It was Shadow’s fault for being so bad at flirting. Really, couldn’t he tell that Sonic liked him back? The blockhead.