FOR YOUR HEART-BOOM

☆Ch11

The next morning Sonic found shocking discovery - the ebony male was nowhere to be found! The azure speedster checked the entire cave belonging to Shadow, nothing. He also checked the wide area around it, nothing. No single sight of the ebony hedgehog. Why? Why was Shadow acting so weird?
'I should have been quiet about the kiss, huh,' he thought bitterly, sighing he rather speeded off back towards the village, since he couldn't be any useful around here. As he arrived to the village, Tails quickly approached him and gripping his wrist he dragged him towards his workshop.
"Woah, woah, hey!"
"Sonic, you have to see this! We finally know, who's behind all this!" the fox boy exclaimed and let go of Sonic's wrist after arriving to the workshop.
"He is responsible!" he pointed towards a cage, where there was a mobian locked up behind the strong bars, another fox. What instantly hit Sonic's sight was the mobian's appearance.
"W-What?! B-But, how?" the azure hedgehog widened his eyes and looked from Tails to the mobian and back multiple times. The mobian rolled their equally-to-Tails ocean blue eyes while gripping the bars tightly. The mobian was literally Tails' twin, the only difference was a lighter shade of his yellow fur. He even had the same natural anomaly in form of the extra tail growing from his spine.

"I would like to know as well," the real Tails crossed his arms while frowning at his mirror image behind the cage bars. The fake frowned just as equally, as if mocking him by mirroring his actions.
"Huh... okay, first of all, who the heck are you and why do you look like my buddy?" Sonic spoke to the mobian, who smirked and snorted.
"You really think I will tell you so easily?" the fake Tails had even very similar voice, it being just very slightly deeper than the real Tails.
"Feisty one I see, shall I call Shadow over?" Sonic grinned at the mobian.
"Sure, show me his dead body," the fake Tails laughed, but much to his surprise, Sonic laughed along with him.
"Bold of you to assume he's dead," the blue hedgehog teased the fake while casually checking his gloves and rubbing his hand in an unamused fashion.

"You saved him, huh! Impossible! The virus was a perfect weapon, that could destroy him!" the fake got upset now, growling at Sonic he gripped the bars tightly, even the knuckles on his gloveless hands turned grey.
"Why would you want to destroy him in the first place?" Sonic questioned the criminal, shocked to hear such words from him.
"In order to protect you from him, Sonic," the fake replied calmer this time with a sigh, his grip on the bars loosening and thus the healthy color returned to his knuckles. Sonic stared at him in shock, so did real Tails.
"Protect me from him? Why? Shadow isn't really that dangerous, as you - or my Tails - might think!" Sonic defended the ebony male and tried his best to not think of their kiss moment from the last night. He still didn't understand it, he clearly felt Shadow returning the kiss! So why was he now avoiding him? It was so frustrating.

The real Tails knew his own truth about Shadow thanks to the previous conversation with Sonic from the days prior, but swore to not speak of it in front of anyone, not even his twin.
"You're naive, hedgehog, hope you know that," the fake snorted and fully letting go of the bars he sat down on the floor of the cage with crossed legs and his hands resting in front of them.
"Hm, maybe, but I at least do not judge someone so quickly," Sonic shot back while crossing his arms. The fake raised his brow.
"Why so protective over him?" he asked at first, but then he dramatically gasped while widening his eyes before suddenly laughing as he pointed at Sonic with one hand.
"Oh sweetness, you love him! No wonder your heart keeps beating so rapidly!" he exclaimed, shocking both real Tails and Sonic.
"Wait, you can... are you an android?" Sonic, ignoring the fake's discovery about him, dared to come closer to the cage, getting a little warning glance from Tails, since the fox was sure, that the fake was up to no good.

"That I am. Created by none other but Dr. Robotnik himself!" the fake said proudly while smiling joyfully, his tails swaying behind him.
"Eggman!" Sonic and Tails exclaimed both at the same time.
"Did he want to get rid of Shadow?" Tails asked his fake twin, who shook his head.
"No. What I remember from my creation, the doctor was blabbering something about finally getting rid of the blue nuisance," the fake explained, now glancing at Sonic from head to toe before returning his gaze to Tails, "but my final programming ended up switching the target," he finished.
"Is there any reason behind such switch?" Tails questioned him further, now straight interrogating him.
"Your memories, Tails. I inherited your memories and clearly saw, that Sonic isn't the real threat, but Shadow is. So, I worked in the background, hiding in a secret little base of mine I managed to create the perfect weapon, which could defeat even such a strong lifeform like Shadow. I was so close!" the fake elaborated further and now the two mobians finally understood everything about the issue.

"I'm out of here," Sonic was done as he turned around to walk out of the workshop, but Tails stopped him by gently grabbing his arm.
"Sonic, wait! Maybe we can fix this! I mean, returning the android to Eggman is out of option, but maybe I could reprogram him," he theorized while letting go of Sonic.
"I am still here, ya know!" the fake exclaimed and banged on the bars multiple times, to no avail, none of the two mobians paid attention to him.
"Do what you think is right, Tails. But I personally am done with that fake!" Sonic growled, without looking at Tails' twin he pointed at him and then speeded off in desperate need of getting rid of the tension, plus to find Shadow and tell him about this.

Much to Sonic's big surprise, the ebony hedgehog could finally be spotted sitting on a flat rock of the beach nearby his cave, he seemingly wielded some item in his hands and watched the ocean waves playing around the shore.
"Shadow!" Sonic called the other's name and carefully walked over him, not getting any reaction from him so far. That made Sonic stop a few feet from him and raise his eyebrow.
"Shadow? Is everything... okay?" the azure speedster asked in concerned tone this time, sensing some sort of tension in the air. Shadow didn't seem to be in a talkative mood, however, he suddenly extended his arm towards him, offering him a bouquet of lavenders. Sonic loudly gasped at the discovery and covered his blushing cheeks with his palms.
"F-For me?" he stuttered out, earning a small sigh from the ebony male, who gently shook his hand with the lavenders, appealing for Sonic to finally accept the gift. The blue hedgehog shook off the big surprise and gently took the lavenders, instantly sniffing their calming scent. Shadow retracted his arm afterwards and rested his both hands in his lap.

"Shadow... I.. thanks, but...," Sonic wanted to somehow start a conversation with the confusing ebony hybrid, but it was so difficult, when he didn't know what was running through his hard skull.
"Don't you like it?" Shadow suddenly spoke and finally turned his glance towards the other hedgehog, his crimson irises had a softness framing the usually dark edge. Sonic quickly shook his free hand while giving the hybrid a sheepish smile.
"Oh, don't get me wrong! The gift is really nice, but.. heh, I thought... I don't know," he got lost in his own wording, not knowing what to truly say, so it would make at least a little sense. He even forgot, that he wanted to tell Shadow about the Tails' twin situation. Lowering both his head and ears he released a small sigh, but then his eyes widened in another surprise, when he saw the extra pair of feet in front of his own, felt extra hands now gripping his shoulders and the soft, saffron lips pressing tightly against his own. It made the azure hedgehog's heart skip a beat before it picked up a pace the more he melted into the loving kiss Shadow so surprisingly gave him. Closing his eyes, Sonic wrapped his arms around Shadow's neck, his hand still gripping the lavenders tightly behind Shadow's head quills.

And finally, he started returning the loving kiss, a little clumsily, since he had zero experiences and was astonished by how skillful Shadow seemed to be, as he was the leading force now. Shadow gently pressed Sonic's shoulders downwards, making him sit down on the soft sand, he himself following suit as he then wrapped his arms properly around Sonic's torso and held him close to his body, never breaking the deep, long lasting kiss he himself initiated today. Minutes later, Shadow pulled away while slightly panting and opening his eyes he glanced deep into the other's eyes. Sonic panted just as much, his heart threatening to burst out of his rib cage. None of them spoke, the ocean waves whispered quietly in the background, some birds chirped high in the treetops and the soft breeze ruffled both hedgehogs' fur and quills.
"So...," Sonic dared to speak up first a few minutes later, "you do love me back?" he dared to ask the ebony hybrid, who blushed in response and averted his gaze.
"Yes, you do~" Sonic giggled and gently booped the edgelord's nose, earning a quiet growl from him. Shadow's shyness was adorable to him.
"By the way, I couldn't find you in the morning, where were you?" he turned the page onto something more serious this time. Shadow sighed and standing up he ended the nice, loving moment between them, much to Sonic's displeasure and disappointment. Everytime he thinks he got closer to him, Shadow proves him wrong.
"It doesn't matter, Sonic," was the only response he received from him before he saw him vanish to the thin air. Why was Shadow still so mysterious? Is he just... fooling around? Is he trying to even trick him?! Various theories, mostly negative, filled Sonic's mind, setting a dangerous bug in there.
"Stupid Shadow! Ugh!" Sonic wiped his lips as if wanting to get rid of the sensation he still felt on them from the way Shadow kissed him just moments prior, groaning in frustration he rather speeded off to his shack, not wanting to see Shadow's cave right now. The only proof of him ever being here is the forgotten bouquet of lavenders laying in the soft sand, waiting for its end.