Chapter 16: Escape to the City
"Ready to go to the city yet?"
"In a minute, Sonic. Same answer like the previous two dozen times you asked," Shadow calmly replied, packing the maps, pencils, a leather bottle, some gold coins he'd found in the Prince's room, an odd thing he thought to be a compass - that had five direction inscribed on it no less - and a fist-sized, polished diamond into a bag he slung over his shoulder.
"Ready to go to the city yet?"
"Sonic!"
The blue hedgehog merely grinned. Even if a part of him was now even more aware of how much the presence of the other sent his heart racing and the blood in his ears pounding, it didn't change an iota of how much amusement he derived from winding Shadow up.
"Just checking. Why are you packing all of this stuff, anyway?"
"The objectory of today is to find the Chaos Emerald, surprisingly. Therefore, I'm packing the essentials needed to navigate in an alien world to us as well as means to bargain with the current owner of the Emerald."
"Yeah, whatever. Can we go now?"
Shadow silently counted to ten. In hexadecimal.
"And where did you even get that diamond? Looks like a Chaos Emerald, but doesn't feel like one."
"I raided the Royal Treasury last night after you had run off. We might be able to switch it for the real one, if we find it."
"You did something exciting without me? That's it, not talking to you anymore."
"Don't make promises you can't keep." Shadow smirked. "And anyway, I wouldn't have gone there without you if you had even turned up. As it was, you were running around the castle until when, midnight? I was almost asleep when you finally thought of returning."
"Um, yeah." Sonic shrugged with his head tucked in between his shoulders, smiling looking somewhat sheepishly, like a runaway dog that knew it had done something wrong. "Couldn't help it, though, just needed some alone time," he said, that grin flashing from rueful to unconcerned in a matter of seconds, "Amy has a way of not just invading your personal space but virtually poking a flag in it and declaring it her own. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if she decided to poke a flag into me next."
The laughter hiding underneath his words made it clear that the blue hedgehog was joking, but right now the hero was also oblivious to the hardening of the jaw muscles and the sudden flash of something murderous in his dark counterpart's eyes. When Sonic turned around, happily chattering on, Shadow had himself in check again, though.
If somebody else tried to claim you, Sonic, I would kill them.
The Ultimate Lifeform paused.
Or would I?
After all, what did he even mean by that, "claiming" Sonic? The blue hedgehog wasn't really something you could just take with you, like a...Shadow's mind searched for a simile...like a cabbage head, he finished and immediately cursed his brain for ruining his dignity even in his own head.
But the thought persisted.
At the moment, Sonic let him be his pretend owner, submitted to the collar and leash and went along with the charades Shadow thought up to keep them both safe.
"-really weird, isn't it? I mean, Knuckles, Jet, Blaze, Black Doom and now Amy. All of them creepily similiar to how they were in our dimension. It kinda bites that Amy was so...callous towards me, though. To me as a slave, I mean. " Sonic was still talking, though sounding more serious now while Shadow stared at him, lost in his own thoughts.
"She was always so compassionate about others, you know? Really had that heart of gold, or at least of some really mushy stuff, that people talk about, couldn't bear to see anyone innocent hurt. That's why I still like her, in our dimension at any rate, when she's not actually chasing me. Or trying to marry me. Or setting a trap to catch me. Or...well, you get the point, anyway." A quick, pained smile here, gone as quickly as it had come. "This Amy...I know she was probably raised to think so, after all I've seen of this whacko world, so I can't really blame her. Even if she suggested to have my spines blunted!"
A faint flush splashed across his cheeks at that notion and Shadow couldn't help feeling his own temperature rise in return. He hadn't really paid much attention, since just the sight of Sonic going through his facial expressions and moving his hands had been enough to mesmerize him.
Claim him...claim this beautiful creature and as his own...oh, how he wished he could. Poke a flag into him, he'd said. But...what if...Sonic would let himself be poked...penetrated...by something else? That would mark him as Shadow's own...
"They raise their children to believe slaves aren't even sentient. I don't like this world, Shads. I want to go home." Sonic had finished his monologue, and crossed his arms in front of his chest. Shadow looked up in the sudden silence.
"Yes. I mean, of course. Not. Er. That's why we're going to the city now!" He finally garbled past his unobeying tongue, refusing to look flustered as unwanted images of Sonic in the stocks, Sonic chained to the bed, Sonic lying defenseless in his sleep next to him danced across his vision.
The Sonic in front of him raised an eyebrow.
"You constipated or something?"
"No, I'm not!" Shadow snapped, anger helping a little to get himself onto familiar territory again. "I haven't eaten for five days, Sonic. Now tell me how I could possibly be constipated."
Sonic shrugged again. "Beats me. Though you seem to manage it for all of the other 360 days of the year fairly well, so..." He gave another cheeky grin as Shadow's expression visibly darkened, wishing he could put that riding crop to good use at the moment.
"Right, let's cut the flying circus for one moment and let me leash you."
Sonic gave a slight moan at this but did not resist when Shadow grabbed him and hooked the leather piece in, just assumed an air of quiet resignation, not even complaining when Shadow held him shorter than usual.
"Good. We're off."
As soon as they were out of the door, however, Sonic visibly perked up again, ears, tail and spikes straightening and rising up as the whole hedgehog looked forward to escape the castle for a while, and Shadow, looking at his back, immediately had trouble keeping his thoughts on track again.
He wasn't a virgin anymore, far from it. Rouge had seen to that. Admittedly, he had been a little bit drunk but the bat was also been the closest thing he'd had to a friend and the only one he had previously permitted to come so close to him. And, after he'd been staying at Club Rouge for a while, one night he had finally given up resisting her advances, had let her push him into bed, had let her...
He recalled the experience as pleasurable, but not particularily exciting. He had never felt the need to go and repeat the exercise with her, afterwards, even if Rouge had been willing. But now, for some reason, Sonic was so much more beautiful to him and so much more enticing...
Shadow briefly wondered whether the blue hedgehog would actually still be a virgin.
I could...I could be the first.
Furiously, he shook his head. this was ridiculous. Even though he was starting to admit to himself that he wanted, needed, hell, loved Sonic enough to want to own him, body and soul, there was no indication that the other felt the same way.
"Hey, you don't have to hold me quite so tight, okay?"
Or was there?
Once again, it was a flood of images, Sonic cuddling up to him in the night, shivering blue fur calmed by his hand, a playful grin after Shadow had thrown him onto the bed after a game of tag, that look he had given him when he had purposefully bitten the hand that fed him, smirking up at Shadow in that garden blooming with twisted roses...
"Hello? Mobius to Shadow? Anybody home in Fakerville?"
"Fakerwhat?"
"Shadow, you're going in circles."
The black hedgehog blinked. Had he spoken aloud? Did Sonic know what was going through his head and how his thoughts were leading nowhere? Could the blue hedgehog even...emphasize?
"How...how do you know that?" he asked, his voice hoarse.
Sonic gave him a long look. When he spoke, he spoke slowly.
"I know that because I can see, Shadow. And we're currently passing the room to our dorm for the third time."
xxx
"We've got to figure out what to do with them," Knuckles said, gravely (if redundantly) to open the session.
"Separate them?" Rouge suggested, looking dubiously at the door behind which 'Sonic' and 'Shadow' were currently locked, one finger put to her lips.
There was a moment of silence as they contemplated that course of action.
Knuckles nodded. "Right. You break that to Shadow."
"No, you!"
Tails sighed. Was it just him, or did everybody seem to be a little bit stuck?
xxx
"...I was just testing you."
"Sure you were. And the fact that you're now consulting a map of the palace doesn't throw me off even a little bit." Sonic grinned, his emerald eyes twinkling where Shadow's gaze tried (unsuccessfully) to scorch.
"Slaves are not supposed to talk back to their masters, you know?"
"Yeah, but that only applies when the Master doesn't get lost on the way to his front door," Sonic shot back, openly laughing now and Shadow was for a moment overwhelmed by that wonderful sound before he remembered that there could be about 101 guards overhearing this conversation. Regretfully, he muffled Sonic's mouth with one hand and briefly clamped his other around the throat to cut off his air supply in a warning. To his immense surprise, Sonic didn't start struggling. The black hedgehog had seen how the collared hero had tensed as his arms came up, his fighter's reflexes immediately trying to ward off a possible attack, but then, Sonic had just relaxed in his grip, stopping his laughing and gazing at Shadow expectantly.
"Right. Eh. Just concerned about our pretense here. Let's continue, then. Quietly," Shadow managed, before turning around and striding of quickly, wondering whether he imagined a certain amused gaze in his back. And trying not to remember how soft Sonic's lips had felt underneath his hand.
xxx
"You wish to go to the City, My Prince?" The guard asked, bowing low, but not able to hide his surprised tone. Shadow waited until the rhinoceros had somewhat straightened himself again before he replied.
"Yes. I am not taking any escort with me, if that is what you're wondering. I wish to go alone and anonymous."
"But ssssurely you're not taking thiss ssslave with you, my Prince?"
It was amazing how just a couple of superflous 's' in a sentence now could give both hedgehogs the wish to pull their fur out. Lazar pretended to not notice the mixture of loathing and I-can't-believe-he's-here-again - despair that flickered over the Mobians' faces.
"Indeed I am, Lazar. Why would you object?" Shadow asked politely, yet coldly. At the same time, he pulled Sonic a little bit closer, feeling absurdly protective.
"But my Prince, any number of reassonsss. He could run off. He could be ssstolen, rarity that hiss colour isss. He could hurt you while there iss nobody who can protect you," the purple lizard reeled off, Shadow wondering whether he had imagined the rather wishful tone in which that last option had been uttered. He sighed.
"Lazar, I told you: Sonic is broken." - he yanked at the leash too quickly for a normal eye to see, indicating to his partner that 'broken' did not entail tapping his foot while bored - "He would never hurt me, and I am very much capable of defending my property alone." He said, subtle changes in his stance letting him assume a more menacing air to underline his words.
"That I never quesstioned, my Prince," Lazar said patiently, but held the black hedgehog's gaze without wavering, his subservience slipping. "But why would you take him to the city at all? He iss a bed sslave."
Shadow raised an eyebrow. "Do I have to justify my actions to you, Lazar?"
"Of coursse not, my Prince. But the rule of your Father iss that ssslaves are never to leave their asssigned areass unlesss there iss an important reassson."
"Well, as it so happens, there is," Shadow replied easily, his mind racing as he tried to think of what on earth it could be. "I need to shop for...special items."
"Ah?" Lazar gave a slow reptilian blink, his tongue flicking briefly as he tried to comprehend. "I am afraid I do not undersstand..."
"Simple," the Ultimate Lifeform shrugged, careful not to meet Sonic's gaze during this explanation or else he would be thrown off track rather quickly, "Since he is my pleasure slave, I wish to buy certain...accessoires. I am taking him with me to see how they fit on and in his body."
Sonic gagged. Lazar didn't so much as nod, letting Shadow wonder what kind of person exactly the real prince must have been if a reply like this didn't even faze the lizard. If anything, he looked disinterested now.
"Iss that sso. Well, in thiss case I wish you successs. Maybe we can incorporate your experience on the market into next week's lesssons when you're focusing on...different matters again," Lazar finished, his tone hinting at just a bit of disapproval on the things Shadow spent his time on instead of learning how to run the country. Of course, if he had known that this particular Shadow wasn't trying to run but rather flee the kingdom in question, he probably would have understood better. As it was, he didn't, and the two impersonators left the castle quite happily.
To be continued...
Hi there! well, once more thanks for that amount of absolutely wonderful reviews - really encourages me to update again and again. :) Hope you enjoyed this chapter!
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