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It always begins as a fantasy.
It’s a dream sequence, an idealised memory. He’s back on the ARK, back with its harsh lights and windows separating mankind and otherwise from the stellar views and celestial bodies out in the vastness. It’s just like it was, but without all of the constant tests and checkups, without the wires hanging off of him and of Her. Without the musk of abandonment and gunpowder.
She’s smiling at him, warm hands against gloves, leading him somewhere. She’s showing him another piece of the world, a girl unacquainted, un-introduced to the Earth and all that surrounds it but a girl willing to learn. Willing to teach.
And how she does. With kindness in her heart, an encyclopaedia in her mind and the sparkle in her eye that proves she knows she’s smart, she opened the door to the world. Every little piece of information—fact or fiction, space or time—was handed down with care, weathered bits of old china found here and there, patterns not quite matching, edges chipped and worn. And it wasn’t perfect but it was theirs.
Shadow would always be being lead somewhere. There was always a new bit of information, a new fact, a new phenomenon. And Maria would fix another piece of china in the vase.
They’d learn, the tests he’d undergo on a near daily basis were suspiciously absent. He wouldn’t ever think it was strange though, as if his naturally guarded nature was instantly abolished when he saw that face. Like when she was there he understood he was important again, that he was undoubtedly loved.
Love was a sparse thing then. It was rarely expressed (if you don’t count the elephant in the ARK) if ever at all. The various staff and scientists? No. Abe? Certainly not, at least not then. Gerald?
Hard to say.
But Maria? It was engraved in her very soul.
Love was never a question when she was around. It was a statement in bold letters, it was power, it was obvious. Maria had love for everything. She loved her family, even when they fought. She loved the staff that let her eat ice cream when she got her medicine. She loved the Earth. She loved old movies. She loved guitar. She loved Shadow. She had always loved Shadow. Maria had never let that be a question.
She’d loved Shadow before he even knew she existed. For months she watched as he grew in a test tube to a stasis chamber. She’d held him up like Simba in The Lion King and spread butter on his forehead (and had then shown him the movie when he’d asked why). She’d begged the professor to let him out even before he was ready. Shadow may have been made to cure her, but they were undoubtedly made for each other just the same. Even the most bitter and nasty G.U.N. agent could agree on that.
Even when he was in a bad mood, even when he snapped at her, even when he cried and asked her late one night why he existed if he couldn’t help her. Even then she loved him anyway.
It’s still just a blur now, but a pleasant one. Nothing has gone wrong. Maria shows him the aurora borealis late at night, and after a pause, Shadow’s high-strung chest relaxes. The anticipatory aura passes. And then they go to bed.
Maria takes his hand in hers again, walks that well-worn path to her bedroom—her sanctuary, the only place she was allowed to decorate on the ship.
It’s like it always has been. Warm, inviting, effortless. It’s decorated excessively, at least in Shadow’s opinion. Posters, banners, pictures and postcards on every wall, fairy lights casting a glow on all that surrounds them, obscenely soft blankets. It’s exactly the type of place Shadow would feel oddly unsettled in, like some unseen force is luring him into a false sense of security. But that doesn’t happen here. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t feel like that yet.
She guides him in, dodging the odd pile of books, sketchbooks and stacks of VHS tapes she refuses to put on the shelf. She insisted on taking everything she could from Earth whenever given the chance. There were even her roller skates cast about, a kind of controlled chaos that kept the solar system of her room spinning. She knew where everything was here, despite every trinket and treasure seeming to pile up in here. A sort of organised mess.
When she’d gotten the roller boots, it was the same day Shadow had been given his shoes and gloves. Maria’s twelfth birthday, what a day. Even despite her condition, how her birthday wasn’t a great time for it, she’d put them on stubbornly anyway, even though she couldn’t walk right.
Shadow had decided that he needed to do something.
Ten minutes later (and after a coaching session with the professor) Shadow had a jump rope tied around his waist on one end, the other held by a squealing Maria who he was carting around at Mach 1. She’d told him how to roller skate, showed him videos of humans doing it and they were peeling around corners in no time.
It’s strange how such small things could spark such vast, open memories.
After a vicious game of go fish (or four) Maria decides to put on a movie. Shadow had always been transfixed by the moving pictures on the smooth screen of the television ever since he saw his first one, so now almost every night she was able to, Maria replayed that joy and put one on.
They eat leftover popcorn, start giggling when the main character’s girlfriend flings whip cream at him, migrate to the bed and finish it there. It’s a comedy this time, something sitcom-ish, Shadow doesn’t really pay very good attention; his eyes are trying to close without his permission. Even despite the lack of tests, he’s so unbelievably exhausted. But it’s that kind of feeling you get when finishing a race, when completing a spar. That satisfaction lying deep within aching muscles and smile carved breaths. But Shadow has never completed a race or sparred at all. So how would he know?
None of that matters though as now Shadow’s head is hitting the pillow. It’s a soft one, his favourite. And Maria shifts next to him, even though Shadow is tired. So tired.
But as he looks up at her hand, the lamp starts to look weird.
And suddenly, the warmth, the world disappears, like it’s falling away from him. And all he can see is darkness, all he can hear is silence, and the change in temperature is drastic, like he’s been plunged into a lake of ice water.
And his eyes snap open, chest heaving, staring up.
Oh.
Shadow should have seen it coming. It’s dark because it’s the middle of the night, silent for the same reason, and cold because the hedgehog next to him has always been a blanket stealer. He should have seen it coming, but he didn’t.
It was a dream. Of course it was a dream. Obviously. His nose stings, throat tightens, pressure building behind his eyes. It isn’t a big deal.
Still, he curls up, breathes as slow and as silent as possible and tries to stay perfectly still. Even though he wants to thrash around and scream and cry and let the rage inside consume him.
He tries many different positions before finally settles lying on his back, quills splayed out. He stares bleary-eyed at the ceiling, the glow-in-the-dark stars stuck to it casting a green glow down on him.
He wishes they were real, wishes he could reach up and let them swallow him whole. Wishes she’s up there too, and that one day he can join her. And the instant realisation that hits immediately after is a sucker punch to the gut. He can’t. He can’t.
Shadow lets out a punched out sound at that, bordering a sob and a breath. Sonic stirs next to him and Shadow’s eyes lock to the back of his head.
His logical brain tells him something about sitting here and doing nothing like he always has. Something about how it isn’t the only option. Something about reaching out. Something about help. Definitely something he’s heard before.
They’re all things Rouge and Sonic and other various friends have told him time and time again, things that didn’t quite reach him, things he’d dismissed as soppy and unimportant. But looking at it from where he is now, it still sounds like a horrible idea. But even so, Shadow starts to consider these words he’s heard before. They’re inviting words, warm words. Words that… she might have said.
And against his better judgement, Shadow listens.
Tentatively, slowly he reaches out, trembling hand eventually hovering over Sonic’s shoulder. With a decisive push, Shadow places his hand on him and Sonic stirs again. He gives him a gentle shake and Sonic finally wakes up.
“Hmuh?” He mumbles, still half asleep. His voice is raspy and braided with drowsiness, Sonic making a great effort to turn over, knocking his hand from its placement. Shadow just freezes. The hard part is over. Sonic will understand what’s happening. Sonic can take it from here, even if Shadow will feel bad later.
“Wh’s up?” The blue hedgehog asks, catching sight of Shadow’s face. He doesn’t respond, if he speaks he’ll cry. His brain screams abort. Abort mission. And out of panic, Shadow swallows his emotions and shakes his head, tearing his gaze away.
“Nothing.”
Sonic’s brow furrows, even out of the corner of Shadow’s eye. “Why’d you wake me up then?”
Words catching in his throat, Shadow churns out a short, “Company.”
The hedgehog beside him snorts a little, shifts closer. “Oh? So you enjoy it then? Finally ready to admit it out loud?”
“No, just—“ He stops himself. Company. He’d lost company he’d enjoyed before, so badly it felt wrong to admit it again, like he was replacing what was lost. Like he was giving it up to be taken from him again. “Just um.”
Sonic’s ears twitch slightly, green eyes catching the low glow of the stars on the ceiling. “What?”
Shadow finally looks at him, the fleeting images of him blurred by tears, already feeling like they’re slipping out of his grasp. He knows he’s losing what frail cover he had like this, letting his eyes drop to the covers under his hands. He lets a thin breath out, lasting long and strung out, Shadow only letting so much slip away from him. Slowly, he leans forward, nesting his head in the empty space Sonic’s arms curl around.
He can’t see Sonic anymore but that doesn’t matter because he seems to know what’s going on already. The hard part is over, the hard part is over. That should be true but it feels like it’s only just beginning. Shadow feels his quills being smoothed over, feels himself be tugged closer and at that a pained cry escapes before he can catch up to it.
Sonic says nothing, just holds him closer. Shadow shivers a little bit and Sonic releases half of him to grab the covers that he stole and throw it over both of them. Sonic tends to pull them off and ball them up to hug them. It reminds him of how when Maria was made to take down the pillow forts she would make so she could tidy her room, she’d pout and then throw herself recklessly to tackle the thing. Try and get as much in her arms at once as possible. Ridiculous. And stubborn.
God.
At that the dam breaks and Shadow is completely consumed. It’s impossible to hold it back, just like when he was so filled with anger and hatred for what they’d done to her, except now it was loss. Longing. It’s that empty feeling in his chest, once filled by rage, now inescapably hollow. It craves to be whole again, screeches in endless agony, tears at the rest of him, destroys more than the hole she left leaving it twice as big. Twice as empty.
Sonic holds tighter, squeezes him every so often. He pets down his quills which want to bristle, lets him cry into his shirt without caring about the consequences. He listens as Shadow lets it out in the only other way he knows how. In order to not destroy everything, he needs to find another way to release all this pain. And this is it, apparently.
The guilt is overwhelming. It’s this ever-consuming black hole feeding on his insides, slowly destroying him from the inside out. Not only could he not do anything about G.U.N, he could have chosen to. But the professor told him to stay with Maria and guide her to safety. And Shadow didn’t have the instincts he has now. Or the experience. And so he listened.
G.U.N. didn’t care. They only cared about the job they had to do, but what harm would it have done to leave an innocent girl alone? Maria wasn’t special to them. They didn’t see her light or her love, they didn’t see her life as any different from the hundreds of scientists and researchers on board that they killed. Just because Shadow existed. They didn’t care, couldn’t differentiate her from the rest. No one left alive.
Except for one.
Shadow balls a fist around the covers, muscles all tensed, eyes screwed shut as his body seizes closed. Sonic appears unfazed, rubbing circles into his back, avoiding quills, chin resting between his ears.
“How long were you awake?” Sonic asks, voice hushed.
Shadow shakes his head. “Not long.” He barely recognises his own voice, so hoarse and scratchy.
Sonic nods. “Mhm? Finally getting used to this whole ‘asking for help’ thing?”
Shadow only shivers and coughs at that, lazily thumping his head against Sonic’s chest.
“Nope.” Sonic presses him closer so they’re almost flush. “What did we say about that again?”
Shadow chokes on a sob before forcing out, “You know, faker.”
“Mmm, remind me?” Asshole. “You know I have such an awful memory.”
“Don’t we all?” Shadow says, a damp laugh punching out of his chest.
After a beat of silence, Shadow surrenders, not because he doesn’t have the energy. He wants to win. “B-Balance, or something.”
“Were you not even listening?” Sonic waits for a response. After coming up empty handed with that, he then shrugs. “Tut tut, Shads.”
Shadow waits. He waits for the lecture, the scolding. But none comes.
“Your good balances out your bad, yeah?”
“That was it.”
“See? You do remember.” Shadow can almost hear the sad smile in his voice. “Wanna tell me what happened?”
And Shadow returns, getting another crashing wave of grief to the face. He doubles over, unfolds his arms from where they are crumpled between their chests to strap them around Sonic’s torso. He clings to him like a life ring and cries. And Sonic is patient. And he lets him. And it’s almost the safest Shadow’s ever felt.
Almost.
Another sob. If this is number two, then number one would be obvious. With Her. In Her room watching Her VHS tapes on Her television. Her project for Her health. Watching Her stars. Drifting past Her Earth. Burning up in the atmosphere. He wishes he did. He wishes this curse could end. He wishes she could have come with him.
But she’d be cursed too. Cursed to haunt even more space junk, chunks of scrap metal and dead people. Fragments of a life she lost. And she’d never return to the planet she’d dreamed of, never walk healthy on the grass, never see the Milky Way like someone was looking back at her.
Maria would never come home. She’d never smile at him the same, never ruffle his quills or grab his hand again, never tell him secrets in the middle of the night. Never again. And that will haunt him forever.
“I know, I know.” Sonic’s squeezes him tight and keeps that pressure. It compresses his tensed muscles together, forces some air out of his lungs and he shuts his eyes again. “Why don’t you tell me what’s going on inside that head of yours?”
Talking about it, about Her, was always hard. Her memory was the only thing left of her, the only thing Shadow had left to protect. And so letting somebody else in was opening up a part of himself, exposing them both to a foreign object. It was scary and dangerous and alien. It didn’t feel right, felt like he was betraying the purity of her memory and tampering with it. Like he was playing with fire.
But at the same time, a part of Shadow wanted to share her light, make the ones closest to him feel just as good as he did. If he could trust somebody enough to let them in on who she was, then wasn’t that almost like the same feeling. The same goodness. The same sort of love. It’s nowhere near as perfect and as planned, but just as precious.
Rouge was the first person he told about Maria. Rouge likes to gossip, loves drama, but that time she sat quietly and listened. Because she knew how sacred Shadow held this, knew how close he kept it sealed to his chest. Shadow had thought back then that Rouge would be the last person he trusted with Maria, but for her to be the first? It put ‘Trust’ into a whole new perspective.
And they’d shared the joy of her memory and that might have taught Shadow it was alright that somebody else knew. Maybe it’s okay now too. Sonic was the second.
“I just had a dream,” Shadow says eventually, rubbing his eyes free of tears.
“Yeah?” Sonic says quietly, pulling back to see his face and releasing the pressure. “About the ARK?”
“Yes.”
“What happened?”
“Nothing,” Shadow says plainly. That word sinks in, leaves an imprint on his tongue. His eyes mist over. “Nothing happened. S-So…”
“It’s okay,” Sonic says, brushing his thumb against his cheek, just under Shadow’s eye. “Nothing had to happen for you to be upset.”
“But I’m not upset!” Shadow blurts out. His speech comes in stuttered bursts. “I-I wasn’t. I was happy. I was content. A-And I felt so warm that I just—When it all disappeared it was just—I-It was… jarring.“
Sonic nods, urging him on.
“A-And it sort of fell away from me, h-her bedroom. And I just—It felt like something had been stolen from me. L-Like my chest was tight and I was so cold and—“ Shadow’s voice catches and he makes a noise he’d usually be embarrassed of. His hand finds its way to clasp across his mouth.
Sonic pulls him back in. “I know. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Shadow.”
Nobody told him that. Not Rouge, not Omega, not Commander Towers when he’d forgiven him. Nobody except Sonic. Nobody acknowledged the injustice of it, the anger he felt, but Sonic did.
Sonic never let injustice slide. And even when he had to he wasn’t ever satisfied with it, the loss always sloshing around in his mind years after. It’s no different when it’s the justice of someone else. Sonic never pushed him to feel any different than he did, only guided him to do the good that Maria wanted for him. He never pried, he never pushed, and he was almost as outraged as Shadow when he heard what had happened for the first time. Maybe that (or a couple others) was the reason Shadow chose him.
The sound he makes is painful. Something awful plunges down his throat and rips the air out of his lungs. He needs to scream but nothing comes out except a strung-out cry. It’s tinny and pathetic.
It’s every thought that reminds him of her. And the thought that one day he’ll have reason to cry like this about so many more. That functional immortality is a curse and nothing more. Shadow shakes with restless frustrated sorrow. He seethes with rage against his creator, the nature of his very being, because his happiest life is one where he never existed in the first place.
And maybe it would have been better that way.
Countless people would be lost to time, kept in the chambers of his memories. He’d be constantly afraid of loss, constantly unwilling to share the last pieces of the people he loved to the new ones. And the cycle would repeat over and over until he’d become just as bitter and angry and cold as he was a year ago, just as hateful towards the world that made him this way, right back where he started this, right back to hating—
“You’re catastrophising,” Sonic says, petting behind his ears. “I can hear it.”
“I hate this,” Shadow says, voice wobbling.
“I know.”
“I hate this.” Shadow’s hands ball into fists, slam over his closed eyes and claw at his face. “I hate everything.”
“No you don’t.” Sonic kisses the top of his head.
Shadow lets out a cry, hands moving again to his upper arms, digging his claws in. “I want to. I hate loving things. I need to love but I hate it. I hate that I can lose it.”
Sonic shakes his head. “That’s what makes it special, Shads. If you couldn’t lose love then it wouldn’t be something you need.”
Sobs are once again ripped out of his throat, punched out, loud and angry. And desperate. Shadow instinctively digs his claws deeper, a sharp slice of pain cutting through the fog a bit.
Sonic shifts back, frowns and pries his hands away, unhooking them like metal shrapnel in skin. He holds one, traps the other under him. Sonic doesn’t mention it (yet) but Shadow can tell he broke skin. Instead he just lets him cry, waits it out, waits for the storm to pass.
“Sorry,” Shadow finds himself mumbling.
“It’s okay,” Sonic replies instantly, that effortless warmth to his voice returning. “I get it. Plus, you didn’t mean to. It’s not bad anyway.”
“Okay.” Shadow lies still, defeated, energy finally petered out. All of his tears have been used, reserves dried up, limbs heavy like beanbags. Shadow’s eyelids want to close but they also want to look at Sonic. Very badly.
Sonic leans back against the pillows behind him, Shadow’s head just against the mattress, eyes glued to him. He catches sight of this and then smirks. Cocky bastard. Shadow hopes a glare suffices in communicating this.
“Cute,” Sonic has the nerve to say.
“Prick.”
“Aww. Thanks,” he says before laughing, a noise that strikes lightness into his chest. Should’ve lasted longer. “You okay?”
“Yes. Now.” Shadow closes his eyes finally and shifts closer. Sonic scoops his head up, still lying back against the pile of pillows. Shadow’s head ends up on his chest.
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Listening.” Shadow clears his throat before adding, “I know you’re not very good at it.”
“Hah!” Sonic smiles that dumb grin. “No, I’m not. But I’ll always listen for you. I promise.”
Sonic reaches a hand out to cup his cheek, delicately cradling it like you would an intricate pattern made of spider’s silk.
“I love you.”
A smile worms its way onto his face and he breaks the eye contact, scoffing. “Love you too, faker.”
“You’re smiling.”
“I know.”
“You hate it.”
“I know.”
Sonic chuckles, brushing back his bristling quills, residual stress now calmed. “But that’s why it’s special, isn’t it?”
Shadow raises a brow. “Because I hate it?”
“Pff. No, you goof,” Sonic smiles. “Because it’s yours.”