Mirror Image

XII - No Strings Attached

"You can't live with yourself this way," said Shadow, his hand crackling with red, "nor can I tolerate your existence after what you've done. Let your punishment be your absolution."

"I would have done it, you know," said Fake Shadow, looking up with familiar crimson eyes, "I would have made the world right for them. For both of them."

Shadow merely nodded serenely.

"I know," he said, "I admit I would have done the same, not that long ago. Until I realised something."

"What was it?"

"Sonic makes the world right."

Placing his hand on the other's forehead, Shadow let crimson lightning course along his arm. The other Shadow tensed up for a second as energy surged through him, before collapsing into the ash. His strings had been cut.

~o~

Sonic's throat burned. What little food he had eaten lay half-digested in the bottom of the dented silver trashcan he propped himself against. Outside the cafe an eerie stillness permeated the air, with only the distant screech of sirens and the low rumble of a far-off explosion disrupting the quiet.

His fur had begun to dry off in the open air, but his muzzle was matted and damp with drying tears. Raw and red skin surrounded his eyes; he could weep no more, though he desperately wanted to.

His stomach compressed again, and he felt another upheaval rising. He retched into the trashcan, uncaring of the foetid stench, but nothing came except more burning heat. His entire chest screamed in agony; his lungs, having partially filled with water, wheezed and choked, his throat burned and constricted, and his heart pounded with grief.

He still couldn't bear to look at his hands, to see the red that stained his white gloves. All he could think about was Tails. What would he say to him? He had always taught his little brother to respect all life, and that killing was wrong in every circumstance. He had even taught him how to safely put bugs out without harming them, and not to trample wild flowers deliberately. Now he stood with the blood of another intelligent being on his hands.

One part of him wanted Shadow to appear, to put his arms around him again, but the realist part of him knew Shadow would not approve of his anguish. The black hedgehog did this sort of thing for a living; he was pragmatic, cold, unfeeling.

Sonic kicked himself. How could he have thought he could be in love with someone like that? Someone who could take another's life without any remorse? Shadow's whole identity centred on death. He was created to kill, and the one person who could have given him a normal life died in front of him.

Yet when Sonic thought about him, saw his handsome face in his mind, his heart still fluttered. He still yearned for Shadow to touch him again, to hold him, and even kiss him. Why couldn't things be simple, like they used to be? Shadow annoyed him, he annoyed Shadow, they fought, their friends yelled at them, rinse and repeat.

"Sonic?" a voice rang in his ear, "what's going on? Are you alright?"

He lifted his head like it was made of iron. Squinting with tired eyes he saw a familiar red echidna standing over him.

"Kn-knuckles," he croaked, "It's too much. I don't know what to do."

"Whoa, dude, you look awful. Have you been using Chaos Control again?" Sonic shook his head.

"I... I k-killed h-him," Sonic stammered, not daring to look at his hands, "I just straight-up m-murdered him. I'm a killer, Knuckles, a killer!"

"What are you talking about?" Sonic lifted his heavy arm to point to the gaping mouth of the ruined cafe.

"In there," he said, before his arms and head slumped down again, "against the counter."