Sonadow Angst OneShot

OneShot

"It's so hard to care for you sometimes!"

"I never asked you to care about me!"

"Yeah? Well maybe I should have never started!"

SLAM! The house rocked as Shadow stormed out, leaving Rouge alone. "God damn it!"

Shadow was shaking in anger. I need to get out of here. He wandered off into the woods, looking for something to take his anger out on. He started mercilessly punching the rock bluff, tears streaming down his face. "I hate you! I hate you, I hate you, I hate you!!" He growled, though he wasn't talking about Rouge.

"Why were you even created? You couldn't do the only thing you were made to do! You are so useless!" He punctuated each word with a harsh punch to the wall. "You couldn't save the one person who cared about you! So worthless! No wonder Rouge hates you!"

"So... useless..." His punches lost power and he slumped down, leaning his head against the now chipped rock. He hung his head and sobbed. He didn't even try to stop himself. Years of pent up emotion poured out.

He knew it was stupid. It was such a small thing to be so upset about. But Shadow and Rouge liked to blow things way out of proportion. He wasn't even sure what started the argument in the first place. All he knew was it built up into a screaming match that Rouge won. Like always.

And now here he was, bawling his eyes out at the base of a cliff, blood and dirt staining his white gloves. He wasn't even sure why he did that. Why he punched so hard- why he started punching at all.

"What am I doing?" he sniffed, weakly rising to his feet. He looked around, wiping the tears off of his face. "Where can I go? I certainly can't go back to Rouge. The cave wouldn't do me any good..."

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A knock came at the front door. Who would be here at this hour? Sonic wondered as he opened the door. To his shock, a defeated looking black hedgehog stood at his doorstep. "Shadow? What are you doing here?"

"I didn't know where else to go." His voice came out as barely a whisper, not meeting Sonic's eyes. His voice was hoarse and it was obvious he had been crying.

"Well, get in here, Shads." Sonic stepped to the side to let the darker in. He noticed the dirt and blood on the hedgie's knuckles. "Tails! Come here!"

"What is it, Sonic?" Tails appeared from down the hall. "Uh, what's Shadow doing here?"

"Go fix up his hands, please. I'm gonna get some stuff for him."

"Huh?" Tails blinked in confusion, but Sonic had already stepped out of the room, leaving Tails alone with Shadow. "Uh- well, follow me, I guess."

Tails led Shadow down the hall to his workshop, his mind brimming with questions. Why was Shadow here? What was wrong with his hands? Why couldn't Sonic take care of this? He knew, however, that this was not the time for such questions. Tails bent over and got out a med kit from beneath his work bench. "Can you take off your gloves?"

Shadow silently removed his gloves to reveal badly bruised knuckles. Tails gasped slightly, partially from the injuries, partially from the odd look of shadows hands. Numbers and letters were carefully branded into the fur on the back of Shadow's clawed hands. This far outdid all the theories that Tails had come up with, although it made sense upon further thought. Obviously he would be branded due to his artificial creation.

Tails quickly broke out of thought, addressing the dark hedgehog in front of him. "You broke your knuckles pretty badly, Shadow. Were you punching concrete or something?" He tried to crack a joke, but if he were honest that was his suspicion.

Shadow just looked away in response, quietly letting Tails wrap up his hands. Not much of a talker today. Tails sighed, finishing off his bandaging. "Come on, Sonic said he was getting some stuff for you."

They walked wordlessly down the hall. Sonic walked into the livingroom at the same time as the pair, a blanket and cup of tea in hand. "Thank you, Tails. You can go back to what you were doing." He nodded to his fox friend as he walked off. "Come sit down, Shadow."

Hesitantly, Shadow sat on the old couch. His posture was stiff as Sonic wrapped the fuzzy blanket around him. "What happened, Shads? Why aren't you with Rouge right now?"

Shadow looked away, face scrunched up. "I see." So it's one of those days. "Don't worry, Shads. I won't force you to talk. Drink some tea, it'll calm you down some."

Shadow took the tea in his shaky hands, but didn't bring it up to his lips. He closed his eyes, his breathing shallow. A gentle hand was laid on his back, rubbing soothing circles. "It's okay to cry, Shadow. You don't have to be scared."

He brought his hands up to his face, still warm from the tea cup. He was acting purely out of habit, not truly processing information. He saw himself on the Ark; instead of Sonic there was Maria. His body shook as he let his guard down, sinking fully into the flashback.

"I've failed you, Maria. I'm- I'm not useful."

"What are you talking about, Shadow? You haven't failed me at all."

"The Doctor said I wasn't enough. The treatment isn't working. I'm not working."

"Don't say that, Shadow! You don't need to be the perfect cure to be helpful. You've made my life so much better, in more ways you can imagine!"

"But- but Maria-"

"No buts, Shadow. You are so important to me. Grandpa doesn't know what he's talking about."

The dark hedgehog sunk into Maria's embrace, his small body shivering with emotion. "It's okay, Shadow. It's okay."

Sonic held Shadow close, not knowing what to do. This is the first time Shadow had broken down in front of him. He's not well versed in comforting people other than distracting them, and that obviously wasn't going to work.

Sonic traced shapes on Shadow's back, applying a good amount of pressure to help ground him. Sonic's fur was soaked with tears, but he didn't mind. Anything for you, Shads.