FOR YOUR HEART-BOOM

☆Ch3

One week passed by, Sonic kept meeting Shadow either by the Canyon or even Shadow's so called 'home'. A hidden cave with colorful glowing crystals scattered all around the interier was what Shadow called his home. And actually, he managed to make it comfortable by placing some furniture pieces in there. Sonic was the only other mobian knowing about it and he swore to never tell anyone about it.

This morning was rainy, much to Sonic's already pretty gloomy mood due to the fact, that he slept only for a few hours and felt tired all the time. He was still laying in his hammock, holding his blanket close to him he sighed and his mind took him to the ebony male again. During the week he gave Shadow a communicator, which he got through another lie. He made up a story, that his communicator fell to the deep ocean while he was on his run, when in fact he just left it in his shack and of course completely shut it off, so Tails couldn't track it down.

And thus he 'needed' a new communicator, which Tails was more than happy to craft for him and give it to him. Sonic then easily gave the thing to Shadow, telling him to always keep it with him in case they might need to quickly contact each other. Shadow didn't express it much visibly, but was surely grateful for such a nice change and returned the favor by treating Sonic a little nicer than usual.

Sonic wore a small smile on his face upon the memory and glancing at his communicator he grabbed it, trying to connect his line with Shadow's.
"Morning, Shad, are you up?" he spoke to it and then waited for response, which never came though, weirdly enough. Raising his eyebrow, the blue hedgehog frowned and checked the device's functions. Everything seemed normal and functional.

"Shadow?" he pressed a button and spoke to it again, then released it and waited. Still nothing. It was alarming to him, but his other side comforted him by reminding him, that Shadow might just happen to be a sleepyhead. Especially during such weather. Releasing a soft sigh Sonic set the communicator down on his nightstand and turning on his other side he tried to catch some more z's.

☆•~•☆

The afternoon, despite getting sunny, didn't bring much comfort to Sonic either, for he tried to contact Shadow a few more times before giving up and letting it be for now as he rushed out of his shack, heading towards the beach side, where Knuckles was currently having his usual working out session.
"Sonic! You decided to join in?" the echidna's eyes lit up, now brightly glistening in the sunlight. However, Sonic wasn't that much cheerful due to the worries filling his core. Worries about the ebony hedgehog, who was nonresponsive through the line.

"Yeah, not really, sorry, Knux," Sonic replied in an uninspired tone of his voice and sat down to the soft sand.
"What's up, buddy?" Knuckles asked him and huffed from lifting the weights and flexing his muscles.
"Just... need a company, I suppose," Sonic replied, unsure, uncertain if what he feels is actually loneliness. He was always happy with the gang, being surrounded by friends or helping the local folks with some stuff often filled him with pure joy and he felt like standing on top of a mountain. And how easy it was to fall all the way down, right? He was on the lowest point again right now.

"Well, I am here! So, you have me as a company now," Knuckles replied in cheerful tone, oblivious of Sonic's hidden feelings. Sonic looked up at him and gave him a weak, nearly fake smile. He had to even force himself to smile today! That didn't happen often to him, unless he would be in some nerve-wrecking situation and he'd, once again, just laugh the discomfort off. Knuckles returned the smile with his genuine, innocent one and setting the weights down he descended next to the hedgehog while wielding a towel to wipe some sweat off of his forehead.

"Amy is throwing a tea party in a bit, wanna join?" he asked his azure companion in joyful tone and Sonic - in order to hopefully distract himself from all the worries running through his head - quickly accepted the invitation.
"Sure! It shall be fun," he tried to sound more cheerful, yet he himself could hear how fake it was. But Knuckles didn't seem to pick up on the subtle gloomy undertone in Sonic's voice as he stood up and lifted his fist up.
"Yay! Let's go!" he grabbed Sonic by his arm and dragged him towards Amy's shack, Sonic gasping and barely catching pace with the echidna.