Second Chances
The Night's Shadow
Sonic did several things to prepare for his and Scourge's date that night. He lit some candles around the table; some long-lasting ones so that they wouldn't melt by the time Scourge got there. He then slipped into the bathroom for a quick shower. Sonic wasn't fond of washing himself in a shower because of his fear of water, but he had grown more accustomed to it as time went on.
After the quick shower, he stepped out and dried himself before stepping into his room. He set his towel on his and Scourge's bed before going into his closet. His tuxedo was hidden on the closed end of the closet with a slick suit right next to it. Sonic grabbed it and took it off of its hanger.
He put the suit on and posed in front on the mirror. He didn't get to wear fancy clothing that much (or really any clothing in general), so he felt that day was better than any to do so. After being satisfied with it, he walked back into the kitchen. Sonic looked at the nearby clock, which read 3:00.
Sonic planned for Scourge to be back earlier than expected, so he made reservations for a movie that Scourge had been asking to watch for a long time. Afterwards, they would go to their dinner reservations.
Sonic waited on the couch for several minutes until he heard voices coming from outside of the front door. He recognized them as Scourge and Tails. Sonic quickly stood up as the door opened, revealing Scourge and Tails with tuxedo bags in their arms.
"I'm home, Sonic," Scourge said as he entered the living room. He saw Sonic in his suit, making his jaw drop slightly in awe. "Wow… uh..." Scourge tried to hold in his smile. "You look dashing, Sonic."
Sonic smiled. "Thanks. We need to look good for our dinner-movie, right?"
Scourge gave Sonic a toothy smile. "That's right."
Sonic nodded. "Alright, good. We have movie reservations for Earth's Core in less than an hour, so why don't you get your suit on and we can get going!"
Scourge gasped. "You mean that awesome movie that I've had my eye on for a month!"
"That's right. Now, get your suit on before we're late and get terrible seats like last time."
Scourge gave Sonic almost a childish smile as he left the room to hang up his tuxedo and put on his suit. Tails stayed in the room with Sonic and sat on the couch.
"So you two have a date night planned?" Tails asked.
"Yep. Scourge didn't exactly like the idea of spending several hours without me to pick out a tux." Sonic sat down on the couch next to Tails. "I suggested a movie-dinner night to make him feel better about it."
"Wow," Tails said with a smile. "It's kind of inspiring to go out of your way because you love someone like that, Sonic. It makes me proud to be your best man."
"Heh, thanks." Sonic smiled and looked around the room for a brief moment before putting his focus on Tails again. He wondered what to talk about, but then he realized something important that he wanted to bring up. "Hey, Tails. Have you seen Shadow lately?"
Tails nodded rapidly, almost as if the name triggered something in his body. "Yes, why?"
"While you two were gone, he came by to check out the new apartment. But then he started telling me to dump Scourge the minute that I start being unhappy with him and come talk to him if I'm ever feeling down. Did he… mention any of that kind of stuff when you saw him? Because he was acting really strangely."
Tails nodded once again. "Yeah, he was being weird with me, too. He didn't say anything to that extent, but he did talk about the wedding for a little bit."
"Wow, that's a bit weird for me," Sonic said as he placed a hand on his muzzle. "I was considering asking him to come to the wedding, but now I'm unsure. What do you think I should do?"
Tails shrugged. "You still have a couple of months until the wedding, so I think we should wait to see if these weird visits keep arising. If he talks about the same thing another couple times, then I think we should probably restrict him from coming to the wedding. His comments would make everyone uncomfortable, especially for Scourge."
"What would make me uncomfortable?"
Sonic turned to his left quickly and saw Scourge standing there in his suit. Sonic's mouth opened wide as he saw the wondrous site. He was so used to Scourge wearing nothing but his small black jacket. But when he was in the suit, he looked dashing. "We were just talking about Knuckles saying the wrong things at our wedding," Sonic lied quickly. He stood up and walked towards Scourge. "But enough about that. You look… handsome."
Scourge gave Sonic a toothy smile, trying his best not to blush in front of him and Tails. "Thanks, Sonic. It's kind of uncomfortable wearing this much clothing, but at least I look good wearing it."
Sonic smiled and kissed Scourge on the lips. "You'll get used to it."
Tails rolled his eyes and said, "And I guess that's my cue to get out of here." He got up and started to head for the door.
"Aw, sorry Tails," Sonic said as he went after him. Sonic opened the door for Tails. "I'll give you a call tomorrow or something."
Tails smiled and nodded. "Don't worry about it, Sonic. Just let me know if there are any changes to the wedding plans and if there are any… new surprises arriving at your door."
Sonic frowned and nodded. "Yeah, will do. Take care, Tails."
Tails nodded and left on his way.
Sonic turned around, making sure he was smiling for Scourge. He didn't want to tell him about his encounter with Shadow just yet. He wanted to wait until things became an issue until Scourge knew.
Scourge rubbed his hands together. "So… what's going to happen tonight? You make it sound so good."
"Well…" Sonic wrapped his arms around Scourge's waist, just the way he liked it. "We're going to have dinner at… McDonald's, your favorite restaurant. Then we're going to come back here, put on a movie of your choice, and we're going to cuddle each other's faces off."
Scourge chuckled. "I actually thought for a second that we would go to a fancy restaurant, but I'm now realizing how dumb that is. We both hate fancy restaurants." Scourge removed Sonic's hands from his waist and turned himself around. He then kissed Sonic on the neck and said, "So… why did we even put on suits then?"
"Oh, Scourge… it wouldn't be a fancy dinner-movie night without a trip to McDonald's in our finest suits, would it?"
"I guess not," Scourge said with a toothy smile, liking Sonic's clever outlook on the world.
"So, let's get going then. We're going to be late for our reservation if we don't."
Scourge's mouth opened up a bit in shock. "Did you seriously make a reservation with McDonald's?" Scourge asked with a heavy chuckle. "How would that even work?"
"Well… kinda. I called and asked for a reservation and the manager just laughed at me. So I took it as a way of saying that we have our reservation right now, so we should go."
Scourge kissed Sonic on the lips. "You're so cute when you do obviously stupid things."
"I try my best," Sonic said as he opened the door for Scourge. "After you,"
"Thank you, sir," Scourge said in mockingly fancy tone.
Upon arriving at McDonald's, they both ordered pretty average meals. Sonic and Scourge got some stares from the locals. Many people knew about the famous Sonic getting married to Scourge (especially since as soon as the word got out, every newspaper wanted to publish that Sonic was officially off the market for all the women. And men.). However, they wondered why they were at such a cheap establishment in such unusual attire.
Sonic and Scourge simply ignored the onslaught of stares and focused on each other. They sat down at a nearby table and waited for their order to be prepared.
"So how was tux shopping with Tails? You were there a bit longer than I expected you to be."
Scourge rolled his eyes and chuckled. "At first, it was all about me and I got to choose what I liked the most. But when I started trying them on, Tails stole the show from me and decided that he knew more about my tastes than I do."
Sonic smiled and nodded. "That's Tails for you. He actually has a terrible style sense since he hasn't had very many girls in his life and doesn't wear any clothes. What he ends up doing, though, is connecting to your tastes to today's styles using nothing but science."
Scourge looked intently at Sonic and said, almost yelling, "There is nothing scientific about him rubbing up my leg to see if the pants clung nicely to them."
"I'm sure it wasn't tha-…"
"He did it three times!" Scourge said as he held up three fingers.
Sonic raised both hands in the air. "Okay, fine. Maybe it was that bad. But it's all over and you now have a tuxedo that you can call your own until the wedding."
Scourge nodded, returning his composure. "Yeah, I guess you're right. But enough about my wild day. What about you? You must've been bored without me to there to entertain you."
Sonic shrugged, trying to figure out what he could to say for this situation. "I, uh… I didn't really do anything special. I prepared the night for us, but that was pretty much it."
Scourge nodded. "Sounds entirely boring to me." Scourge gave his signature toothy smile. "But I guess I'm here to make it better now."
Sonic smiled. "Yes, you are." Sonic kissed Scourge's cheek, something that he has been used to doing. "Tonight's going to be a pretty fun night. I can feel it."
"I can feel it, too."
They continued to talk and eat for the next half hour before eventually leaving the McDonald's. It was a bit past sunset and it was starting to get a bit dark on the way back to their apartment. They took slow strides, looking at their feet so that they made sure that they didn't trip or step on anything.
"Wo, wo," Sonic said, putting an arm out in front of Scourge to stop him. There was a large mud pile right in front of them. "These are really nice suits and getting mud on them wouldn't exactly be the best thing right now."
Scourge chuckled. "I didn't think you cared that much about the suits, Sonic. You were never one for any form of clothes."
"Well, I'm not. But…" Sonic turned to face Scourge and smiled. "They're suits, and I look good in them. You do, too."
Scourge rolled his eyes, even if Sonic couldn't even see him do it. "I do look good in this suit."
"Exactly, so let's avoid getting them dir-…" Sonic was cut off when he suddenly felt a force on his back that propelled forward. He immediately lost in his balance and fell in the large mud pile, splashing a bit of mud an inch into the air.
Sonic was beyond shocked. He looked up at Scourge and asked, "Did you push me? I thought I told you not to get the suits dirty."
Scourge placed his hands in the air. "What? No! I promise I didn't push you into the mud, even though that would be something I totally would do and it is entirely funny."
Sonic smiled, thought Scourge couldn't see it because mud was covering his mouth. "So… you think this is funny? You know what would be funnier than one hedgehog in the mud?"
Scourge leaned down in a smirk on his face and asked, "What would that be, Sonic?"
"Two hedgehogs in the mud!" Sonic grabbed onto Scourge suit coat and dragged him into the mud.
Scourge rolled around in it and got the mud out of his eyes and mouth. "I should probably just kill you for that, but I guess I deserve it."
"So you admit to pushing me in!" Sonic inquired.
Scourge shook his head. "No, this is great and all, but I didn't push you in. Maybe you were thinking about how sexy I am in this suit that you couldn't keep your balance."
"Oh, is that what you think?" Sonic challenged.
"It is exactly what I think."
"Well, then I guess I'm going to have to punish you." Sonic playfully tackled Scourge, getting even more mud on the both of them. They both rolled around in the one, trying their best to be the one on top in the end. They laughed and chuckled throughout the whole time, and they wouldn't have it any other way.
However, while they were doing that something came out of the night's shadow. Shadow the Hedgehog was in the alley the whole time and waited for them to pass by. He sighed as he watched Sonic playfully tackle Scourge around in the mud. Shadow found it sickening but he had to deal with it… for now. He chaos-controlled away from the scene.
