Sonadow
SonicXShadow
Once Upon a Time by Taranea

Chapter notes:
No, this story is NOT dead and WILL be finished!

Now watch as poor Shadow will have to sort out not-quite-lenthills, the good ones from the bad ones...

Review please? :3
„Prince Sonic! Please do pay attention!“
The addressed hedgehog sighed. “I am, Rosie.”
“Well, then you´re not looking as if you would, my Prince.” The frowning squirrel replied, patiently holding out two pairs of white silk gloves that looked exactly alike to Sonic. “Now which pair should it be?”
“I don´t know! There´s no difference! Has any of them a sixth finger, or what?”
“Please, my Prince, you have to look the best for the ball.” The nurse continued, indicating the other parts of the outfit they had already chosen. (Well…she had picked out those ones Sonic had regarded with the least despise, at least.)
“Oh, Rosie…I don´t want to go to that ball at all.”
“That is silly, Sonic.” The elderly woman smiled, easily slipping into the address she had used earlier, when he had still been a child. “There will be lots of pretty young girls wanting to meet you. You should look forward to it.”
That is exactly my problem, the blue hedgehog thought, but didn´t say anything further.
Once Rosie had taken a few final measurements around his waist and then disappeared, Sonic sat down heavily.
“Choose a girl, choose a girl…that´s so easy for them to say.”
He raised himself again and trotted over to the window, looking over the castle grounds and to the horizons beyond.
It wasn´t that he didn´t know any girls. He just had never felt anything like love for them. Most were just friends.
I bet they wish I´d be more like Amy, he thought, snorting. His sister, the princess, was usually head-over-heals for anything even remotely male...or even her own species.
She was going through boyfriends like Sonic through running shoes (and boy, was it hard to find some decent ones in a medieval fairy-tale setting), although her brother thought the current one might just be Mr. Right.
From the room next to his he could hear her giggles and chuckled, as the next sound was the surprised shriek from a young, male voice. Amy had recently taken a liking to the son of the count and Silver was probably right now in the room with her and finding out just how quickly his sister could seat herself in someone´s lap. The prince was secretly betting that the poor metallic coloured hedgehog would probably lose his single-status and/or virginity by the end of the month.
Sonic thought about the two and snorted, then did a double take as he suddenly saw his reflection in the mirror. He was blushing…but it couldn´t be because of Amy…the girl was his sister, for the gods´ sake…so was it because of Silver? But that was a guy…
”Then again, he IS kind of cute. Wait a moment, where did that thought come from?!”
Sonic held his head in his hands. It was true…he had looked at the other hedgehog sometimes and wished he could sit next to him on the couch, too…but…did that really mean…?
Oh gods.
Lots of guards´ heads turned as a very distressed prince was once again running past them at sonic speed.

---

“Shadow! Wash your sister´s feet!”
“She doesn´t have any feet!”
“Then wash her tentacles!”
The black hedgehog groaned and went to work, all the while avoiding the rest of the starfish´s limbs which were wriggling around like mad with giddyness.
“Oh, Shadow, I´m going to go to the ball!”
“Yeah. Great.”
“And the Prince is going to marry me!”
“Yeah. Sure.”
“And I will be Queen!”
Whoever that prince is, I pity the poor guy already.
Shadow said nothing and continued with his work.
His stepsister´s eye narrowed briefly at this lack of reaction. She calmed her flailing a little and then turned towards him again, this time her tone carefully neutral.
“Say, brother…wouldn´t you like to go to the ball, too?”
He snorted. “Yeah, right. As if your father would let me.”
“Well…” she gave a little pause here before she continued in an odd casual tone, “…maybe if you just asked him, he would give you a chance.”
“Uh-huh.” Shadow had now started the challenging task of trying to get his ‘sibling’ into a dress – a rather difficult venture, since the creature had three arms too much and no waist to speak of…plus a distinctive lack of other female assets that usually serve to hold a dress in place.
Nevertheless, Eyeleen insisted on wearing a corset as well, which didn´t make things easier at all.
“And why would he-” Shadow stopped and grunted, as he got to a rather horrible part, which was were all the tentacles should go while he was forcing the corset to hold, “-do that, pray tell?”
“A favour for a favour, brother.” She gave a little laugh, that sounded incredibly wrong, but ignored Shadow´s wincing, “There´s still some rather…difficult chores to be done, I understand. Perhaps you can make him an offer?”

Later, while Shadow was going through all of his other cleaning duties and tasks, he mused on the words of the starfish. Hell, when he thought about it, he would actually like to go to the ball…anything to get away from this place.
It took all of his courage that night (and all of his mental volume to silence the voices screaming ‘This is futile, you idiot! You want to end up a hedgehog pancake, or what?!’ in his head) to walk into the room of his ‘uncle’ and speak to him.
“…Black Doom?”
“What is it? Have you finished your work for today?” The monstrosity grumbled, not really taking any of the three eyes off the newspaper they were currently focused on.
“I have. I wanted to…” he had to force the next words out, ancient survival instincts insisting that he was right now digging his own grave, “…I wanted to ask whether I could go to the ball with Eyeleen and you.”
Three red orbs stared at him, uncomprehending.
“You what?”
“You heard me.” A note of defiance had crept into his voice once again, even if he knew that was not likely to get him anywhere. The eye ridges of Black Doom were already dangerously bunching together again, indicating that a personal ‘Mars Attacks!’ scenario for Shadow was only seconds away if he didn´t think fast now.
“Eyeleen has said you might let me go if I finished some ‘difficult chores’ for you. She wasn´t being specific, though.”
The thunderstorm seemed to have passed. Black Doom leaned back again, his expression now less angry and more oddly interested.
“Has she? Oh well, in that case…” he pursed his lips, which is not something you want to see when the purser only has a sucking hole for a mouth.
The young hedgehog´s ears unconciously pricked up in hopefulness at this new tone.
“…I think I might have something for you. Come with me.” Shadow didn´t know it, but if Black Doom could, he would have grinned.

---

“You want me to what?!” Shadow was stunned.
“Sort out and then kill all of the Hero Chao in my farm. I´m raising Dark ones only.”
Black Doom indicated with a wave of his arm the pens over pens that were stretching into the distance.
“There´s freakin thousands!” the ebon hedgehog was swaying between furious anger and disbelief. How could his adopted uncle do this to him?! First build up hope and then let it crash, it was like breaking the wings of a bird before he´d left the nest!
“Well, you knew I had a big farm. And I have a feeling it´s the gravestone for that wretched Maria of yours that you set up which let so many of them turn hero in the last few months. I can´t have them contaminating my entire stock.”
“Maria…was not…wretched…” Shadow was trembling with anger, grinding his teeth and clenching his fists as he glared up into the face of Black Doom.
“Whatever. My offer remains, though. Get rid of all these halo-wearing pests until tomorrow morning and I will take you to the ball.” With a sort of liquid shrug, the alien-like creature turned and floated away, ignoring Shadow´s various cries of ‘until tomorrow morning?!’, ‘you want me to kill them?!’ and ‘what on earth is inside your skull?! Cause, It can´t possibly be a brain!’.
Black Doom didn´t even spare the ranting hedgehog a second glance.
“Tough Luck. Try it or not, your choice.”
Shadow stared after the retreating form, wondering what on earth he must have done in a former life to deserve this.
Maybe setting small kids on fire was my hobby or something, he thought surly.
Undertaking this chore would take the entire night. And the ball was already tomorrow.
Nevertheless, he would have to get to work. Shadow picked up one of the hero chao from the pens that had skipped close to him, large friendly eyes smiling up into his face. Would he even be able to do what Black Doom wanted from him?
His hand gently closed around the neck of the small creature, preparing to stop the airflow to its lungs.
It started to rain.

---

Prince Sonic was sitting. His face was creased with worry and he was staring out at the small lake where he was currently perched on a stone, wondering just how on earth he was going to get out of this mess.
“So…I don´t like girls. Not that way, anyway. And tomorrow, I´m going to have to choose a bride. Okay.” He recited, more to himself, trying to once more repeat the facts he already knew and to possibly find a solution.
Then, he dropped onto his knees and tore at his quills. “Auuughh! This isn´t going anywhere! I might as well just kill myself! Mom´s going to do that for sure, anyway!” He pounded the ground once with his fist in sheer exasperation.
The wind picked up and he shuddered. He wasn´t wearing anything but his shoes, a thing to which he was unused. As a prince, Sonic usually wore at least a shirt and a silken vest, if not being fully clothed. He didn´t really need anything to cover himself per se, but Rosalie for the most part insisted on a finer attire, to distinguish himself from the commoners. Right now, Sonic didn´t really wish to be recognized as anybody, though. His hands rubbed over his ribs underneath the blue fur, trying to at leats get back some warmth. He had fled out here into the forest for some alone time and covered more than ten miles with his speed. The sun had already sunk beneath the horizon and now the prince shivered in his blue fur. At the castle, Sonic estimated, all hell had probably already broken loose, now that the heir of the throne had gone missing a day before the big ball.
“Maybe I should just jump into that stupid lake and save everyone a whole load of trouble.” He muttered miserably. He usually was an optimist, but right now the thought of having to spend his entire life with somebody he couldn´t possibly ever love held his heart in an icy grip, threatening to shatter it.
It started to rain.

---

Shadow, however, was running. And stumbling, and slipping and falling and getting up again and running on. All with yet another three little passengers, going ‘wheeee!’ all the way.
Goddamned cuteness.
Of course he hadn´t been able to harm a single one of them. Of course he had been seeing Maria´s face looking so incredibly disappointed if he even thought about killing them to go to the ball. Of course he now had to spend the entire night running through this dark, wet, rainy forest to deposit the Hero chao somewhere safe so a) they wouldn´t get killed later and b) he could at least pretend to have finished his mission.

---

Sonic stood up and faced the liquid, gleaming silver in the moonlight. He hated water. He couldn´t even swim. But right now, it seemed so tempting…
His fur was drenched. It probably wouldn´t even feel that bad if he went into the water now. Shivering, he gave a mirthless smirk. What a pathetic picture of a ruler he was. Soaked, naked and shivering, somewhere out in the wilderness, contemplating suicide.
“Yeah, that´s probably the best thing. Then Amy is the eldest child, she can become queen, marry Silver, mom´s happy and everyone has a new ruling couple…”
He stepped forward. Then froze, as suddenly something came crashing through the woods.
“What...?!”
“Aagh!”
The twigs and branches in front of him were torn apart. A dark form came tumbling through them, the newcomer barely catching their balance again on the wet soil. Three chao that had been with the stranger fluttered away wildly, immediately loving the clearing.
The figure straightened. It was a male hedgehog, jet-black fur barely recognizable against the dark background, but the red highlights in his quills were gleaming in the rays of the moon.
The only things he wore were a sash tied round his waist and a vest, both made from a coarse, brown fabric that was already torn in places. He looked almost like a slave.
Never his eyes, though.
The fire in that crimson gaze spoke of an almost unbreakable will of its owner, even when the dark hedgehog looked around wildly, trying to take in his new surroundings.
Then their eyes locked. Both gasped. Sonic suddenly felt very vulnerable.
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