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After a few hours or days at the casino, tethered, mainly, to the bar while Sonic sunk buck after buck into NiGHTS pinball, Shadow walks through Station Square, the midnight wind on his stickied, warm face. He’s nowhere near as drunk on four Midori Sours as Sonic is on the adrenaline of winning his last roulette bet. He boxes the black air ahead. “Aw yeah. Lucky number 23, right, Shadow? What’d I tell ya?”
Behind his hand, he lights a cigarette several times before it catches. “I don’t know,” he says with it in his teeth, huffing once. “I didn’t listen.”
“C’mon, let’s race,” Sonic says, the exhale a visible vapor within the cold night. “I’m too excited to walk.”
They’re just passing the train station when Shadow taps ash on the ground. He doesn’t say anything, no, because he’s planning to ambush him, to take off in a gust that leaves Sonic hanging, last to the finish as usual. Instead, there’s a great glow, one they both shirk away from until it dies down and two feet clack the sidewalk. Shadow squints. Sonic, naturally, is already talking.
“Long time no see, Silver,” he says, which reminds Shadow of the guy’s name in the first place. Sonic has on a smirk he doesn’t like and a tilt to his hips that he does. “What brings you by?”
“Huh,” Silver says, “Huh,” looking around and catching his wits. Under the overdrawn liner, his eyes go thin and wide and thin again, leering at Shadow like he’s recalling the feeling of a boot to the back of the head. “I’m supposed to be in Rone.”
“Pretty sure that’s over in Italy,” Sonic tells him. “This is Station Square. Wonder what it’s like in your time.”
“Oh, is this the city that used to have the big train station? By the beach?”
“You’re looking at it,” Sonic says, pointing Silver’s gaze toward the building behind him.
“Huh,” he repeats, staring with reverence, it seems, before returning to Sonic. “I guess putting it so close to the beach wasn’t a good idea. But don’t worry about it. There’s still some land left. I’m pretty sure this is what we call Chizubahga now.”
“S’pose that burger place with the old guy statue is pretty good. I never thought they’d name the whole city after ‘em, though.”
Shadow raptures the last inch of his cigarette. “Their pickles taste like cucumbers,” he says, freeing a mouthful of smoke.
“Is that…does that mean he likes it?” Silver asks Sonic, like Shadow’s on his fancy and short leash. He grinds the orange butt into the sidewalk a little too gruffly.
“Well, between you and me,” Sonic says, perfectly projected from his depthless mouth for the world to hear, “I’m not sure Shadow likes anything. But he’ll eat most things in a fast food wrapper. Kinda like a dog, or something.”
Shadow growls. “You’re more wolf than I’ll ever be."
“Huh, that sounds like a compliment,” says Sonic.
“What’s fast food? Were there different speeds people ate at like, er, culturally?” Silver asks. His nose wiggles. “And why was there an old guy statue at the burger place? What guy? Who is he?”
“Chill out,” Sonic says, as if he’s ever relaxed a moment in his heart-pounding life. “Do you mean you guys really don’t have fast food restaurants in the future? How’d you escape?”
“Oh, it’s a restaurant?” goes Silver. “There aren’t many of those around in general. You have to be a certain kind of person to eat at a restaurant.”
“Yeah, what kind?”
“I guess, well…” Silver seems to think before he speaks most often, though Shadow can’t tell if that makes it better, at all, that he still comes to such brainless conclusions. “It's kind of a waste. I mean, you get your exact rations every week, and all you have to do is cook them. People eat out more around Holiday especially, even though that’s the time of year you get a pie, too.”
Shadow recalls some anecdote about mothers running into old friends at the grocery store.
“Didn’t we like, fix your timeline?” Hands on hips, Sonic tips his head. “Is that really what it’s like anyway?”
“What?” goes Silver. The streetlights lay blindingly over his star-colored fur. “Is that weird? How often do you get pies now?”
Because he’s gaudy with half-friends, Sonic tosses an arm around him. He grins. Bold and privy, known-him-forever kind of nonchalance. “Let’s go. Dinner’s on me. I just won big time at roulette.”
They start moving, a natural caterpillar built of them each. Silver doesn’t look quite comfortable under Sonic’s arm, but Shadow doesn’t quite like having to walk in the puddley street to keep astride them, either, so Marty McFly can suck it up. “Oh, yeah?” Silver says, or maybe, “Oh, yeah,” before he finishes, “there used to be a casino here, too. I remember reading about that, when I was looking into weird stuff that used to be legal.”
“Silver, my friend,” says Sonic. “I’m going to show you a new world tonight.”
“It’s really the old world, isn’t it?” he asks. Shadow can practically taste his innocence, and would sort of like to ruin it. Sonic gets to it first, though, walking him in through the doors of the McDonald’s behind Station Square Hotel.
With Sonic— posed by Silver who gawks the menu —taut beneath his supervision, Shadow sits. He takes the corner booth like they do any morning Sonic’s convinced him into hashbrowns and terrible coffee after just missing complimentary breakfast by the extra minute or two they flirted and bit and pinched and tickled and chased each other laughing round the unmade bed. It’s too bright in here unlike the casino, where he’d had to bend into the bar television to read his scratch ticket numbers. He watches the cashier watch them from underneath her visor. She’s pretty enough, and her lip gloss reflects those putrid fluorescents in the best way, but he couldn’t get past burying his nose in her curls at night and smelling the unscrubbably deep roots of fry oil. Though, he also supposes, really, that a woman’s worth more than her stink, and any unsuspecting cashier isn’t asking to be rated on his personal fuckability scale, either. And he supposes nicotine with alcohol makes him suppose lots.
Sonic drops a bag on the table. “See, you say to go, and then sit,” he’s advising, “so you don’t have to bring the tray back up. Anyways,” and hands Silver three empty cups like the slack & field star he is, “Dr. Pepper for Shad. Sprite for me. Unless the Fanta’s working, then I’m feelin’ that. Do you still have orange Fanta in a hundred years?”
“It’s two hundred years, um, wait, what?” Silver splutters, and Shadow starts to remember why he did kick him upside the thick skull once upon a time, though all of 2005-06 really is quite the blur. “Are those…drinks, right? Like soda drinks? Can you really have that in such a big cup?”
“You know, I’m beginning to think I won’t be missing out on much,” Sonic says, and winks at Shadow. “Have fun without smoking and gambling, Mr. Vampire.”
“Oh, smoking still exists,” Silver says. The bright lights blink and a few joyful children wait in line with their father. “Actually, the cigarette industry is a big deal nowadays. They had to spend a long time rebuilding their reputation after electronic vapes were a thing. I mean, can you imagine a world where everyone’s addicted to those? It’s so harmful, but smoking cigarettes indoors used to be illegal instead? Seriously bizarre.”
“I think I’ll be fine,” Shadow answers.
Nodding toward the cups again, Sonic squishes in beside him. “Remind me to show you a Stiiizy later, I think it’ll rock your world. Mind grabbing the drinks now? There’s a machine right over there.”
“Oh, uh, sure,” Silver says, glancing over. He looks back at them. “Humans don’t hate people who look Mobi right now, do they?”
“Alright alright, that’s a pretty outdated term,” Sonic says, waving an irked hand. “Go and get the sodas. You’ll be fine.”
Obediently, he tends the mission. Sonic starts crumpling open his big fatass burger while he’s already chewing fries. “Mind moving over?” he gripes, the same way he’d phrased it to Silver and everyone else he doesn’t assume can x-ray-spectate a hero’s inner vulgarity. Mind doing this and mind doing that, do you mind unballing gym socks and clown-scarving blue hair from the shower drain for the rest of eternity, Shadow? At least if he offers the choice, he can use it as a shield, his solid gold heart that wouldn’t ever dream of acting impudent or demanding or downright bratty in the way Amy Rose has always described him, a way Shadow never caught on to himself until catching a handful of quills to shove an impudent, demanding face into the hotel bedding. But he digresses. Moving a checker of space aside, Shadow unwraps his McChicken, and he digresses.
“Pretty great night so far, huh?” Sonic asks with mustard on his lip.
“It’s closer to morning,” says Shadow, looking out into the thin gray of the world beyond the windows.
“Nah, they’re not serving breakfast yet,” he says. “I tried.”
Shadow gnaws his sandwich.
“I mean, it’s cool to hang out with somebody new once in a while. Plus, all that winning I did earlier. And this was all only, like, eight bucks. Bet it’s an arm or a leg for a burger in Silver’s time. I should go help him, actually. He’s still trying to find the soda button.”
“The phrase is ‘an arm and a leg.’”
Sonic stands there and stares at him. Shadow, for more split a second than any, sees magic and rage and pride and hunger in his lover’s eyes, before Sonic leans over and takes an absolutely massive bite of his chicken sandwich for no good reason other than tyranny. Shadow’s still seething when he returns with three icy sodas and that other guy. Lettuce stuck to his face, like the impudent and demanding god Set after stomaching all of Horus’ ownership atop a crunchy leaf, Sonic sits, nudging him another inch. “No worries, though,” he says to Silver across from them. “There really should be a sign or somethin’, you’re right. At least the Fanta wasn’t out.”
“Yeah,” Silver says. Like Tails does, he laughs to hide how his insides glare with shame. He snorts and swallows a loud throatful of snot before reaching for his hamburger, because apparently etiquette will go out of style in a century or two. Suppose everyone’s too excited for Holiday pie to worry about elbows on the table. Suppose, too, he’s supposing too much, but he supposes if he had the other half of his sandwich that’s slinking through Sonic’s gullet, he’d know a greater focus in life. Shadow glowers, abducting the paper fry vessel right from his hands and tipping back the last of its innards.
“So, how ya liking it?” Sonic asks Silver as he shoves against Shadow to sip off his straw, which is, too, a mouthful. “Taste as good as rations?”
“It’s interesting,” Silver says, and swallows. He chases it with soda and smacks his sticky lips. “I feel like there’s more stuff in this than you need, isn’t there?”
“Yeah, like what?” Sonic asks.
“Like, you know, extra sugar and fat,” Silver clarifies. “More than what you need to live. I mean, it’s interesting,” he says, taking another muffling mouthful. “But why would you eat it? There’s no point, is there?”
“Let’s see, how should I put it…” Sonic taps his foot on the tile and scans around. The joyful children have taken to weeping and flailing after a debacle over their Happy Meal toys, but their father’s alright still, since he never knew joy to begin with. “There’s some things in life that ya just…like. Right? Cheeseburgers, cigarettes, soda, pinball. Stuff like that.”
“Sure,” Silver nods. He glugs his drink some more. “I expect those things to be pretty special, though.” One last bite of greasy superfluous meat stuffs his cheeks. “This sort of tastes like salt, I guess. But I get it. I like collecting American quarters, even though you can’t spend them anymore.”
“Exactly,” says Sonic. “You like that, Shadow likes losing races to me, we all have our hobbies.”
“I thought he didn’t like anything,” Silver says, genuinely, and Shadow waits until Sonic opens his second big fatass burger to snatch it from him and suffocate it.
“Nah, like I said,” Sonic reiterates, moving on to his drink, “he likes to eat.”
“I’ll show you eating,” Shadow lowly promises, keeping Sonic’s dirty stare as he kisses ketchup from his thumb.
Silver coughs. “And you’re sure humans are on good terms with Mobians right now? Even if you’re gay?”
Shadow looks onward. Loudly, Sonic laughs, because his little brother got it from somewhere.
“I mean, is anybody okay with anything these days?” he stumbles coolly over. “Just be you, that’s all. Nothing else matters.”
“Oh,” Silver says. He wipes the salt off his mouth. “You know what, I might have my history mixed up. Is this 2051?”
“Close,” says Sonic. “We’re a couple decades before.”
“Oh,” he repeats, and, darkly, his face changes. “You’re right. You should be enjoying yourself while you can.”
While Sonic blinks, Shadow, the opportunist, takes the drink from his hand.
They part on the pavement outside. Sonic bets something cheeky, like Silver couldn’t possibly use his telekinesis to crack open that parking meter over there, then gifts him the quarter flung out. “Texas,” he’d said, and waved their visitor goodbye once he fizzled into white light again, off to tweak whatever timeline needed saving hours ago. As the glimmer fades, Sonic’s smile goes with it, so Shadow knows he’s feeling wrong before they’ve even finished the walk back to their hotel room (the walk that’s quiet enough to savor the whistling night, so Shadow really does know something’s up).
The moon overlooks them, watches between the blinds billowing in the air conditioner’s breeze. Shadow isn’t excited for the point he’s finally shivering enough to stagger around the darkness to shut it off, but he never is, and Sonic’s making a face like he can’t stand to lose anything more tonight; silently, Shadow picks his fingernails until Sonic turns a gaze at him— Sonic, on his side of the bed, rips his tension off the ceiling and turns a gaze at Shadow, fake-happy, the faker that he is. “Ya have fun tonight?”
“I don’t think so,” says Shadow to his ungloved hand. “What did we do?”
“Casino, McDonald’s, nothing fancy. Silver was here.”
“It was alright.”
“Yeah,” he agrees. “He sure was excited about that quarter. Must be nice to be so easily pleased.”
“I wouldn’t know,” says Shadow.
“Me neither,” says Sonic, smirking. “You know how much it takes to satisfy me.”
Like a saltwater snapper, Shadow spies the lure, yet swiftly Sonic reels, “Y’know, it really does make ya think, though, knowing you’ll be able to meet back up with him someday. You guys’ll both be there.”
Through the husky light, Shadow shifts against the sheets to stare at him, Sonic, the horrible blue pebble he’s had stuck in his shoe for the last ten thousand miles.
“I don’t think I’ll search very hard,” he murmurs.
Sonic nods. “Sounds about right. You’re always too busy chasing after me, anyway,” says he, and abruptly shows a grin, whispering right where his voice will not break, “aren’tcha?”
Shadow’s eyes trace his mouth and trace his nose and pamper his warm body and love him til the lights go out, til he’s worn through so many centuries of soles that he cannot feel where that old pebble dug a scar into his skin all those years ago, way back when he still went running. Before he thinks, he says, “It feels like I was created to be your shadow.”
Sonic watches him. Then, as the air conditioner roars alive, he throws an arm across his eyes, and sets free all the tittering he keeps.
“Stop laughing at me,” Shadow snaps.
“‘M not laughing,” he replies, and titters some more.
Shadow watches him. Then, as the air conditioner hushes off, he drapes his weight overtop him like a blanket or black hole. Sonic hurks a big snurk into the quiet, palming the last of his fear down his face.
“Eh, it doesn’t matter,” Sonic says in Sonic fashion. Shadow feels an arm snare up around his back. One last sniff sniffles itself. “You’re only sweet on me ‘cause I won all that money earlier.”
“No,” says Shadow. “It’s just fucking freezing in here.”
“S’that all it takes to get you cuddled up to me, tough guy?”
“Mhm,” Shadow answers, clinging now, truthfully, to him, around him, deep down inside him at the core. He hides his face in his heartbeat and claims all the radiative red warmth that exudes.
“Heh,” chuckles Sonic. He cards his fingers through another man’s hair. “You’d be by my side no matter what. Makes sense, I mean, you said it yourself: you’re my Shadow, after all.”
In the sweating hot hotel room, Shadow pretends he’ll decompose someday if only to let a peace lily grow from his soil, and holds Sonic even closer.