Bring Me The Head Of Prince Charming

by Taranea, for ShotsofSunshine

Chapter 1: Only Fools and Fairies

"Amy. I repeat: It's Sonic the Hedgehog. Not Sonic the Packhorse."

The complaint coming from the blue hero was rather muffled, seeing as it emerged from about three bags of groceries piled on top of him. The addressed pink girl, however, only skipped up the stairs to her apartment ahead of him merrily.

"Oh, come on, Sonic. You're strong, you could probably carry me on top of those as well!" This was accompanied by a giggle.

If you gave me 7 Chaos Emeralds beforehand, yeah, Sonic privately thought, but didn't say (seeing as he was attached to his spleen and did not want to have it ripped out). Aloud, he replied, "Yeah, well, I don't see why Shadow – hmph! - has to carry so much less!"

"How is an *entire veranda grill* 'less' to carry, faker?" a somewhat peeved giant cardboard box at the bottom of the stairs inquired (or rather, a black hedgehog undersaid box).

Sonic stuck his tongue out. "Less items. Plus, you can carry heavier than me, so that only seems fair."

The Ultimate Lifeform only shot the blue speedster a glare as he gave the box containing the newly-bought barbecue another heave up the stairs towards the girl hedgehog's apartment.

"Just because Professor Gerald designed me with greater muscle strength does not make me the local delivery boy."

"Whine, whine, whine. Emo."

"Sonic-!"

"Now, now, boys, quit fighting. We've already made it, anyway," Amy chided as she unlocked the door to her domicile and let the two males straining under their load enter. Sonic dumped the groceries on the kitchen table with a sigh of relief, just as Shadow carried the box with the barbecue inside.

"Finally," the blue speedster exclaimed, pressing his gloved hands into the small of his back with a pained expression on his face. "I can't believe we had to buy so much food for everyone."

"Well, believe it or not, that's what a party for a dozen people takes," Amy replied with a smile, before winking. "Especially with the Chaotix."

Sonic couldn't help but grin. "Heh, yeah, in between the two of them, Mighty and Vec could probably eat all of this stuff alone," he quipped, rubbing a finger underneath his nose.

Shadow rolled his eyes. He of course didn't need food at all, even if he enjoyed the occasional snack, but had little to no understanding for certain people and their eating habits roughly resembling those of a starved wolf pack.

"Is that all you needed us for until tonight?" he asked instead, turning to Amy. He would look forward to some peace and quiet at his place at Rouge's before the albino bat dragged him to their planned little party at the hedgehog girl's apartment. Getting forced to attend the group activities was one of the downsides of living at Club Rouge, but it was far outweighed by the advantages (such as having to pay no rent – or not getting asked about the occasional blood stains. Rouge was the good kind of landlord).

"Yeah, I think so, thanks to both of you," Amy replied, giving the blue and black hedgehog a bright smile. "I can prepare the food and decorate the apartment by myself, no probl – oh."

"'Oh'?" Shadow repeated the word in a questioning tone that already expressed whoever was asking this question did not expect anything good to come out of it. As predicted, Amy immediately gave them both a faintly sheepish and embarrassed smile.

"I, uh, think I've forgotten to pick up the dip, guys. I might have to go out again."

"Yeah, but you don't need us for that, do you?" Shadow asked. He and Sonic as the two strongest had been voted to help Amy carry home the groceries (or perhaps not technically the strongest of their circle of friends, but Knuckles wasn't allowed in the supermarket anymore after last time, Mighty had a habit of accidentally breaking shopping carts, Vector scared shopping assistants and Big...well, you try chasing a brain-damaged cat through the fish section after he's lost his goddamned frog again.) Suffice to say, the two hedgehogs hadn't been particularly happy about it, but had obliged. Now, though...

"Well, no," Amy admitted, "but...the dip place is at the other end of town, and until I get back...would you terribly mind baking the cupcakes and maybe decorating the apartment a little?" she asked with a pained smile.

The Ultimate Lifeform gave her a slightly incredulous stare.

"You want us to bake cupcakes?"

"And decorate the place. Come on, guys, it's not that hard! Please, Sonic, Shadow?" she pleaded, looking at them both in turn. Neither of the males seemed too enthusiastic.

"Well...alright. If Shads helps too," Sonic finally gave in, since he could see there was little chance the party would go ahead without it. The black hedgehog's face fell a little more at the announcement, but at least he didn't voice any objections aloud. Amy immediately looked cheered.

"Awesome! Thanks, boys, I'll try to hurry," she promised, before already heading out, trademark red boots clattering down the stairs outside. Sonic and Shadow turned to look at each other.

"Faker, have you actually ever baked before?" the black hedgehog asked dryly, and the blue speedster's face immediately turned into a somewhat embarrassed grin.

"Uh...now that you mention it..."

Shadow wanted to facepalm.

"But I'm sure it's really easy!" the blue hedgehog piped up right after, characteristic enthusiasm taking over. Shadow didn't say anything. His one baking session with Maria aboard the ARK had ended in a disaster, but he wasn't going to share that. Instead, he tried to assume a more business-like tone.

"Fine. Let's carry the barbecue out of the kitchen so we have space to move in it, first."

"Okay," Sonic agreed, and together they could actually lift the box a lot easier – the two spiky heroes managed to get it out of the narrow kitchenette, and carried it through the living room to deposit it on the verandah – where something caught Shadow's eye.

"What," the black hedgehog asked, "is that."

That being a table in the corner next to the verandah door, covered in a star-dotted satin cloth, with leather-bound books, bottles with colourful liquids, pearls, precious stones, jars and vials, a candle, cards, an incense burner, a few tacky figurines of dragons and similar fantasy creatures, scattered amulets, crumpled parchments, a quill, an ink bottle and even what appeared to be a small crystal ball. It looked pretty much as if an esoteric shop had exploded in the corner of Amy's living room (or perhaps had decided to crawl into the corner and die there).

"Oh, Amy likes to dabble in magic, I think," Sonic commented casually, sauntering up next to Shadow and regarding the odd assortment. "She's actually chasing me because her Tarot cards told her I was her 'one true love', you know?" he asked with a bit of a lop-sided grin.

"Magic?" Shadow repeated, snout barely crinkling in thinly veiled distaste. The black hedgehog had been raised a Robotnik by his creator Professor Gerald and his adopted genius sister Maria, and thus had inherited a scientist's irritation at any and all phenomena that refused to be explained by logic.

(It actually explained a lot of his issues with Sonic.)

"Yeah, well, not real magic, obviously," said blue hedgehog smiled at him. Most of it's mumbo-jumbo and the rest is fairy tales, but hey, if it keeps her happy," he said and winked, while at the same time picking up a book and idly dusting it off, "I mean, everybody knows that spirits and spells don't really-" - he took a closer look at the cover, read the title Arabian Nights and sloooowly put the thing down again - "...nevermind. But yeah, I figure it's a fun hobby if you like that kind of thing."

"She probably fashions voodoo dolls of you at night and brews love potions in her spare time, I'm sure," Shadow replied dryly, and had the satisfaction of Sonic briefly cringing. Nevertheless, the black hedgehog couldn't help but also step a bit closer, never having seen any 'magic' items, fake or not, in real life before. Sonic leaned with one hand on the table, apparently amused that something had piqued an obviously reluctant Shadow's interest. He liked spending time with the dark hedgehog, especially since the Ultimate Lifeform so far was still mostly a complete enigma to the blue speedster – so, seeing some genuine curiosity break the aloof facade was always a peak.

A black eye ridge rose as the striped hedgehog scanned the page of the book that currently lay open on the table. It was a passage about comparisons between pixies and fairies, and the genetically engineered creature was hard-pressed not to roll his eyes again, a 'comparison' between pixies and fairies making as much sense to him as, say, people tearing each others throat out over colour or number of imaginary magic stones or perhaps relationships of fictional characters.

Next to him, Sonic was having fun eying and examining the little vials and jars on the table, a chuckle escaping him as the blue hero discovered one that was labeled 'pixie dust' and indeed seemed to contain some strange sort of glitter – glorified confetti, no doubt, and he just hoped nobody had made Amy pay much for it. Letting her indulge in her play magic was one thing, but he didn't like his friends getting taken advantage of. Now, though, a particularly mischievous grin briefly flitted over his peach muzzle as the hero of Mobius suddenly was struck by another idea – it was a childish prank, to be sure, but he wasn't above kiddie humour. While Shadow was still busy shaking his head at the perceived nonsense on the book's page, his blue doppelganger innocently popped the cork from the jar he was holding and poured just a small amount of the glittery silver sand-like substance onto his palm, before raising his flat hand in front of his face, grinning.

"Hey, Shads?"

"Yes?" the black hedgehog looked up, turned his head into the direction of Sonic – and wound up getting a faceful of sparkle blown straight into his mug.

"Ah-CHOOO!"

"Yaaah!" Sonic cried out, flinging an arm up and averting his face to protect himself from any grouch-germs the other might have been able to sneeze at him. He blinked, prepared to either give a shite-eating grin (or turn tail and run if the other tried to maul him) for coating him in glitter – and then green eyes turned as big as loop-de-loops as he actually beheld Shadow. The black hedgehog was currently rubbing his eyes himself, and there was an undercurrent of cuss words escaping from his mouth that probably would have been enough to kill kittens three blocks over, but they stopped abruptly as he finally opened his own eyes and looked at Sonic himself.

"What the-?"

"Uh, Shadow-"

"Why are you so big?" the black hedgehog exclaimed, red eyes wide and gloved hand pointing at Sonic's nose. The blue speedster, still in shock and gaping, was unable to reply with anything but the obvious.

"Shadow, it's not me who's big..."

"What?" The black hedgehog repeated tonelessly – and then noted several things. Namely, that he was suddenly standing on the table and no longer on the floor. Second, that every single other item in the room was suddenly very, very big as well. And third...

Shadow could see something move out of the corner of his eye and slowly turned his head over his shoulder.

To behold two pairs of translucent, filigree and slightly quivering pairs of dragonfly wings attached to his back.

Shadow's eye twitched. Then:

"Sonic. You are DEAD."

To be continued...

Hi there, hope you liked! :D This fic is part of an Art Trade with Shots of Sunshine and her prompt was that I write a story to go with two rather cute pictures she's drawn of Sonic and Shadow in a somewhat...altered state. :P Have a look at my profile for the links.^^ Hope you liked, second part will be up soon! Meanwhile, feel free to say hello at Summer of Sonic, just have a look around for Blacksmith Tails, hanging with Sir Percival (Skyblaze) and Sir Lancelot! :D