#watchinglikeasonic

Sonic stirred, backing away from the tree and holding his head as an obvious wave of dizziness overcame him. That was most definitely a hard hit. "Y-yooo... Hey, Shadowww..." Suddenly, he blinked rapidly, righted himself, and turned on his heel, eyes widening as he met Shadow's gaze. "Wait, Shadow? Is that really you?"

Could you blame Shadow for being confused? "Er... Yes, it is." 

Apparently that was the right answer, because Sonic's face lit up. "Oh, man! I'm so glad to see you!" He spread his arms as if to embrace Shadow, but then he let them drop awkwardly and scuffled a foot. "Uh... I mean..." He cleared his throat. "I've been lookin' for you, but I didn't find you anywhere. Where've you been?"

"In my house." Looking for him? Why would Sonic be looking for him? Shadow put his confusion rather bluntly, "I thought you didn't care where I went." Yes, he knew immediately which Sonic this was, and the last time they'd met, it wasn't anything short of a spat.

To the blue hedgehog's credit, he flinched. "W-well, haha, y'know, uh..." He shrugged, a sheepish smile taking its place on his face.

Shadow narrowed his eyes suspiciously as Sonic slumped against the tree he crashed into, apparently not over his dizzy wave. Somehow, though, Shadow doubted that the dizzy wave had anything to do with why Sonic wanted to see him. "What do you want?" 

It surprised him to see the normally proud blue hedgehog look down, ears ducking. "It's... It's kinda hard to say. I mean, a lot of stuff's went on, and I wanted to see how you were doin', and say what's up, and all that. It's been ages, right? So I thought, maybe--"

"Get on with it." 

Sonic shrank back. "... I wanted to say that I'm sorry."

Now it was Shadow's turn to fall unusually silent. He stared at Sonic, what he just said not really sinking in. He knew the jersey-wearing blue hedgehog to be prideful, strong, and to never admit to his mistakes; he knew him to have scorned him, blamed him for GUN's actions, and running around laughing like an idiot at his expense. He knew Sonic to be aggressive and without regret. Every kind thing that he thought about any of his alternates came from his boyfriend, not from him. It was him who polluted his view of alternates in general in the first place.

He'd never, ever known Sonic to apologize.

It took a while to reclaim his voice, but once he did, his brain didn't work fast enough to come up with anything other than, "What?" 

Apparently that was the appropriate question to ask, because Sonic played with one of his gloves as he continued, as if the question had been a trigger, "I've been a real jerk to you, right? I said some things I shouldn't've said, and I left things unsaid that I should've told you. Like... The fact you're not a monster, and stuff like that. I heard them, but I just didn't... I didn't say anything." Mostly because he had, guiltily, agreed with their assessment. It wasn't as if he could be completely blamed; he'd seen Shadow blow humans' heads off. Still, he should've said something, right? He should've offered to help. "And I..." Shit, shit, shit. Sonic's lips started to quiver at the next thing; it didn't help that Shadow hadn't said anything since he'd began this apology. "I... I ended up hurting you, didn't I? Like, really bad. And so you--"

"That wasn't your fault." 

Sonic blinked, disoriented. "What?"

Shadow's expression had lightened over the course of Sonic's apology, and now he had the decency to look ashamed. "You're not responsible for..." He sighed, "for what I did to myself. Only I am." He thoroughly regretted it with every fiber of his being, too. It was deserving, then, that Sonic had even found out about it in the first place, even though he was curious as to how he did.

Sonic frowned. "But couldn't I have done at least something?" The question caught Shadow off guard, not because of it being an unusual response but who was asking it. "I mean, I could'a been there, I could'a checked in on you or something... I didn't know." He rubbed his temples. "I didn't know but I should'a known. And I'm really, really sorry."

Never before had the blue hedgehog radiated such sincerity to him. It must've taken a lot of courage for him to admit to his mistakes, to come up to him like this and actively search him out, and he had no idea how long he'd been at trying to do it, either. Sonic's posture had been the most vulnerable he'd ever seen it. He was only ever used to seeing that expression on his boyfriend's face; he was only ever used to his boyfriend playing around with his gloves like that, or apologizing like that. Thinking about him made regret seethe in his stomach, but he decided not to focus on it right now. He had a hedgehog to attend to right in front of him, after all, who looked scared to death that he would be rejected again.

All they'd been doing to each other was rejecting each other and hurting each other. Surely they could make some sort of compromise. He doubted that they would be the closest friends (his boyfriend would always remain in that spot), but he couldn't see why they couldn't try again. As long as Sonic improved (and he'd seen evidence of that here alone), then it was worth it, wasn't it? Maybe he could take him in to celebrate with the two of them. After all, it had to be his birthday, too.

"Apology accepted, Sonic." 

Sonic raised his head and made eye contact with him. Shadow's lips twitched with the hint of a smile; the blue hedgehog gave a full one right back. Right, they could try again. Nothing needed to be permanent. It hurt, but they could move past it for the both of them.

And then Sonic went right back to proving he obviously wasn't used to this kind of thing. He dug his fingers into the bark of the tree behind him as he awkwardly moved his head to the side. "Yeah. So. Uh... Thanks." He didn't know how else to address what just happened, the relief that he felt, and that no doubt Shadow himself felt as well. He tried to casually brush it off, this vulnerable position making him feel somewhat weak. "So-- Right. What're you even doing out here, anyway?"

Shadow's quirking lips instantly turned into a frown. Sonic feared he made a mistake before the black hedgehog elaborated, "I had a bit of a tiff with my housemate." He wasn't sure if he was comfortable telling this alternate that one of his alternates was his boyfriend just yet.

"Oh?" Little did Shadow know, he knew all about his little 'housemate', but he decided to keep quiet on that. "What happened?"

Shadow sighed. "It's his birthday today, and I suppose I was being too much of a...what do they call it... Someone who's very negative and brings the mood down...?" 

"A 'downer'?"

"... Yeah, that's it. I felt that he was being too dismissive, and I'm guessing he felt that I wasn't letting things go." 

Sonic nodded. "I can understand that." He paused. "Whatcha gonna do about it?"

Shadow turned around on his heel and glanced back at Central City, frown still rather present. What was he going to do, indeed. No doubt his significant other was more than a little upset with his sudden leaving. It seemed like he made him constantly upset lately... "Go back and apologize, probably." He had to. He had to make it up to him, after the hurt he likely put him through. It was a silly thing to argue about in the first place, anyway, now that he thought about it.

The blue hedgehog cocked his head to the side. "Okaayyy. So uh... You need some moral support for that?"

Actually, Shadow thought that wouldn't be a bad idea. Little did he know Sonic had his own reasons for wanting to go back to see his housemate aside from 'meeting the family'. "I would like to handle it on my own, but I suppose there's no harm in you accompanying me at least to meet him." He doubted it'd go over entirely well, but his apology wasn't going to, either. Might as well get all the anguish out of the way and over with now.