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Prompt#4 They have their first kiss, and neither of them are ready for it.
8/8
It was a frigid night and though the fire that had begun to burn not but a few yards away tempted him to draw closer, Shadow did not budge an inch. Sitting on his perch at the edge of the island, the hedgehog gaze was set upon the darkening sky. Mobius's sun had vanished, the burning star leaving vibrant streaks of violets and reds to bleed into the darkening hues of blue.
Usually the Ultimate Lifeform would take up space around the shrine this late into the evening, however today was a 'special' occasion. Not only for the Sonic Team but the entirety of Mobius itself. A meteor shower that only passed by their little planet once every 50 years was scheduled to take place in just under an hour.
As one could guess, the island became rather rowdy for this occasion. After all, what better peak to get a full view of such a spectacle other than Angel Island herself. High in the skies, closer to the stars than anyone on land could dream of being.
Knuckles was surprisingly lenient on letting the Sonic Team on the island when they asked permission to camp up here for the night. Grumbling that they better not make a mess or else he'd make the lot of them regret it but, still, it was far less scolding Shadow usually heard his lover dish out.
The hedgehog ensured he sat at a safe distance from the rest of the Sonic Team, having spent enough time gathering things with them this afternoon. He appreciated the bunch well enough but there was a distance he preferred to keep when it came to the over-friendly and rowdiness of their little group.
Besides, while the others had looked forward to the occasion with enthusiasm and glee, the Ultimate Lifeform couldn't bring himself to share their excitement. Many of them would be seeing it for the first time; but for Shadow… it would be his second time.
His second time, in the absence of someone previously forgotten.
Even as the night drew nearer the only thing he could seem to grasp was a sense of loss.
He shut his eyes to attempt to cast away these thoughts, but in his mind's eye, all that plagued him was the memory of his own puny hand placed against the surface of cool glass. Wriggling excitedly next to another small hand, frail but resting at his side. The smiling face of a friend long gone, who would never get the chance to see such a spectacle again. Her story was over. The final page of her life left unfinished, uncharted and to never be continued.
The ugly truth soured his body from the core.
Lost in trying to get away from his own thoughts, the hedgehog didn't hear the sturdy footfall approaching him from behind until it was too late. A warm, slightly dusty indigo blanket was thrown around his shoulders, prompting him to open his eyes and address the one who'd begun to settle down next to him.
"Decided to abandon your friends now have you?" He said, trying to at least appear fine, but if there was anyone his jabs weren't going to fool it was Knuckles.
It was also Knuckles who made the first move. Who ignored his previous statement only to shuffle closer and press their shoulders together. "Are you alright?"
Spoken lowly enough so no nosy bat ears within the vicinity could pick up on the question, Shadow looked at the echidna from the corner of his eye. Knuckles face expressed nothing but sincere concern… as everything was when it came from the Guardian. If the question had come from anyone else, Shadow wouldn't have humored them with a response. But Knuckles was a different story. The look brought a wave of fondness to go surging through his chest.
Void still ever present, but oddly… soothed.
Shadow gave him a placid smile.
"You'd forgive me for not being as enthusiastic as you and your friends." Knuckles assessed him, looking him up and down before responding.
"Maybe I'll forgive you if you tell me what's wrong."
Another prod, Shadow acknowledged but decided to deflect. "I find their excitement overbearing-" Is what he said, before taking the edge of the blanket and tugging it around Knuckle's shoulders as well. Pulling the Guardian closer by default. " -and unnecessary. You have all been to space before, seen your fair share of stars and planets alike. What else is there for you all to revel about?" He scoffed, but not unkindly so. "A mere meteor shower pales in comparison to the many other things we've seen in the cosmos."
Knuckles seemed to think about it for a moment, before shrugging. "You're right."
Shadow raised a brow, wondering where exactly Knuckles was trying to lead this conversation. Shadow decided to do some prodding on his own, to see where it would get him. "You share their enthusiasm?" Knuckles nodded to his question. "Your home dwells within the heavens of Mobius day in and day out. Surely, you must have witnessed meteor showers more than the rest of your friends. So why have you been so enthusiastic?"
The Guardian squinted at him, playfully suspicious. "What is it to you?"
It seemed if he wanted to get answers from his lover he was going to have to dish his own out first. Shadow let out a soft sigh and leaned back against the trunk of the tree. Crimson eyes lifting to glance upon the awaiting sky once more. "This is not my first time seeing this spectacle." He said, finally. Speaking as if a weight had been tugged off his shoulders. "I have… memories of the first time I saw it. It was beautiful, of course. Awe-inspiring to my newly created eyes. But it wasn't the shower itself that sparked joy from me, but rather… the one who I shared that moment with."
Knuckles said nothing but gave him the space and the silence to continue his admission.
"That person is gone and gone with them is the happiness that moment brought me. So if I wish to enjoy this night with you, regardless of the obstacles from my past that attempt to stop me from doing so, I have to understand." He turned to Knuckles who now looked at him with a look of compassion.
"I want to understand what this means to you, Knuckles."
That was when Shadow first saw it. The first 'shooting star' to fly across the already glittering night sky. But he didn't see it from the source. No, he saw the first glittering rock pass right through the reflection of Knuckle's eyes.
The hedgehog' gasp was faint, to everyone but himself.
Knuckles must have seen it too, from his peripheral vision, because just as soon as it passed the echidna turned his head to look up. Shadow, as if on auto pilot, followed suit and his lips parted from the unexpected vision of glittering lights.
It was as if the sky had become alive whilst they weren't looking.
He could faintly hear the excitement from the others but a few yards away. Watching the meteors pass from the ark was nothing like watching them from the surface of the planet itself.
Even so, as the burning lights danced across the already glittering night sky, Shadow gaze slowly pulled itself away from the otherworldly display, only to look at the one sitting next to him.
The bright lights traversed over the Guardians amethyst eyes, as he stared on in silent content. A calm eerie gentleness in his gaze. In those few moments, he looked as if he was truly at peace. While there still laid a pit of grief in his own heart, there was loneliness set deep within Knuckle's gaze that seemed to swiftly vanish beneath the luminosity of the stars.
"There are hundreds of theories trying to explain the purpose behind meteor showers, stars, the cosmos, from all across time. Some believed them to be bad omens, signs of doom. Others believed the opposite, messages or signs of recognition from their gods.” Knuckles gently pounded a fist to his chest. “But my people have always believed in a a universal unity to being able to witness an occasion such as this. One both the living and dead could enjoy." Shadow sat still, listening to every word that left the Guardians mouth.
"Call them meteors, space debris or shooting stars, what have you. The name always changes, but the feeling does not."
The Guardians' lids lowered to rest peacefully on his face.
"The opportunity for true reunion, fleeting as it be, is a moment cherished by all who live and all who stepped further from that which they call life."
His eyes reopened. "It's an old proverb, prominent enough to be one of the many teachings that survived on temple walls till this day. Whether you believe in mystics or science, the understanding that these are gifts not to be wasted is shared throughout them all." Knuckles turned to him, smile gone but expression no less tender than it was before. "An opportunity for true reunion. That is what it means to me."
For a moment, all Shadow could do was stare. Letting the echidna's words bring a new avenue to his own sorrow. There was a gentleness in his gaze that the hedgehog had seen before, but the intensity of that very moment felt even more raw, because underneath the burning lights traversing across the sky, those eyes truly looked like gems. And they shone with adoration in their mists.
A wide loving smile spread from kind eyes all the way down to the dimples of her cheeks. "We will see them again one day, on the surface. Together."
Shadow's eyes burned, an unfamiliar sensation rising from behind his own eyes. He swallowed the warmth of the memory down before he could lose hold of it once again.
The echidna blinked in surprise when he felt the hedgehog's hand take hold of his own. Both their hands entangled in the grass beneath them. Shadows fingers gripping onto his with purpose. Knuckles smiled and took the bolder step forward to press their foreheads together. Shadow's forehead was cool to the touch but it did nothing to deter the Guardian from the loving gesture.
After a few moments passed between them, silently pressed against each other… Knuckles thought it best to interrupt their shared silence when the brightness of the sky began to dim. "You asked me what it meant to me, and I told you. So watch it, before it's over."
He softly uttered his next words without shifting his gaze not one bit.
"I am watching."
Knuckles was caught off guard by the tender rumble in Shadows voice and pulled back by just a millimeter, taking in the ultimate lifeform in his entirety. Unaware to the rising adoration building within the Ultimate Lifeforms chest, slowly soothing the sorrow that once laid there. He squeezed the echidna's hand in his own before not so subtly moving forward. The warm blanket all but forgotten and left to fall from both their shoulders. He kept closing the distance between them until their legs touched and Shadow had to tilt his head in order to bring their faces closer.
Now, Knuckle's hand began to tremble.
Was he- were they going too-
Neither of those thoughts would ever get the chance to finish itself because just when the biggest meteor came burning across the sky in all it's cosmic glory, illuminating their little enclave within the gentle swaying trees, their lips met; for the first time.
…and the entire forest went silent.
The sound of their friends talking and laughing, the crackling of the campfire just a few dozen yards away, and the cosmic fizzing from the meteors above fell quiet, as if smothered beneath an ocean. The tree's ruffling ceased and the light buzzing of the fireflies, flying around their faces were gone with the wind.
Knuckles sat frozen, eyes still wide and alert as hedgehog's lips pressed onto his, gently, firmly, sparking his own meteor to go exploding within his chest.
It went on for so long and yet not long enough. The feeling of soft but cool lips left his own and he had just enough sense to let go of the breath he'd be holding. It was the only verbal sound that was truly registering within his ears.
Shadow pulled away by just a fraction of the distance, his crimson eyes sliding back open to gaze into Knuckle's own, unseeing as they were.
His thoughts came piecing together back from the scrambled mess they'd been in, and only then was he able to piece together what'd just happened, with whatever cognitive ability he had left in him.
Shadow had just kissed him.
And Shadow was now blushing.
Shadow had kissed him… and it- it was-
Before the hedgehog could pull away from him, Knuckles seemed to blink away enough of his initial shock to reach out and pull him back by the tuff of fur on his chest. All the adrenaline in Knuckle's body was doing him no favors so the echidna mustered up the strength to speak, even if it was only one word.
"Again."
It was barely a whisper, but Shadow had heard him.
The distance between them closed and they found themselves kissing, once again. Their lips met, gentle and seeking, lungs abandoning whatever need for oxygen their bodies demanded. Both their eyes closed as they allowed themselves to get lost in the shared sensation.
Knuckles let out a muffled sound at the intensity of this second kiss. His other hand squeezing the life out of Shadows' own. If it hurt the hedgehog any he definitely didn't show it, for he was far more interested in pressing forward. Deepening their kiss as Knuckles would allow; as if he found what he was looking for and was vividly demanding it without second pause.
Their lips parted only to meet again, a tender and chaste peck before they finally found the will to separate.
"Knuckles." Shadow's voice was noticeably more shaky when he said his name and it made Knuckles want to dive in for another kiss all together. However, when the hedgehog looked at him with unadulterated adoration in his eyes, the echidna startled and flushed a bright red. Immediately overwhelmed from the weight of so much affection.
Just when the echidna thought he might combust into flames, Shadows face fell into the crook of Knuckles shoulder with a heavy thump. Knuckles jolted at the unexpected move, and looked at him in bewilderment. "Shadow?"
"It's nothing. Just..." The Ultimate Lifeform buried his face as deep into Knuckles red fur as he could. "Just give me a moment." The echidna didn't need to see the others face to know he was blushing just was furiously as he was; not when his entire shoulder was warm from the heat coming from Shadow's face. Though embarrassed from the brashness in which he instigated their first kiss, Shadow had not one regret. He'd go through the pain of reclaiming the warmth from each and every memory if it meant he got to experience new moments of joy such as this.