Chained

Chapter Thirteen

As the night time arrived and Shadow was sound asleep, Sonic stood from the bed and quietly walked out of the room to not wake him. The time had come, the time for him to speak to his mother about everything.

Walking down the long set of stairs, he had walked in on his mother and Amy, who swiftly stopped in mid-sentence to lay her eyes on the azure prince. Once again, the usual blush raced across her cheeks and she shyly looked away.

Aleena stared at her son, then, back at the seemingly embarrassed maid, "Amy, go make a pot of coffee."

"Y-yes ma'am…" she spoke in a whisper and walked out of the room with her face down.

"What can I do for you?" She asked her son as she adjusted the silk robe she was wearing, "shouldn't you be asleep."

He shook his head, "I…wanted to talk to you about something. It's important."

"If it's about that low class slave then I don't want to hear it."

"But mom…!"

"I said I didn't want to hear it," Aleena repeated herself with a hint of annoyance, standing from the chair she had been on and walked across the room.

Sonic's gaze followed her sharply, his hands balled into a tight fists. A Low class slave? A freak? A pariah? Why was it that everywhere Sonic went, somebody was insulting Shadow. Growling, he couldn't take it anymore, "no, you WILL hear it! For once in your life, listen to me!"

Aleena expeditiously turned to face the young prince, "don't you ever talk to me like me," she admonished.

"No, I will talk to you like that," he spoke, walking up to her so they were now face to face, "you have no idea what you caused when you send that 'low class' away, you have no idea how much pain and torment he was put through his entire life all just because of his looks. Just because you got money and because you're the queen, does not mean that you aren't of equal value, everybody is equal. The crown you're wearing is just stuck to far up your ass for you to realize that. Shadow is of equal value as you are."

"Where are you going with this?" she asked with a sigh, the quicker she ended this little dispute the quicker she can get her son to shut up and she can get to bed.

"You say he's low class….but, didn't you take in Amy when you found her cold and homeless on the street? You never hesitated to help her nor did you ever give her up. You raised and turned her into a maid since you knew that if you were going to raise her you might as well give her a job to do, to make her useful to you. And aren't you giving up the crown to me next year since you know I can handle it?"

Aleena never answered, she did intend on giving her son the crown the very day of his eighteenth Birthday but, a part of her knew that perhaps she should hold off the ceremony until the day he was ready much rather than sticking to tradition. Yeah, Sonic could handle it but, that meant that he would have to grow up more than acting like a child. That's why she fired Knuckles, there was no more time to carry on, she had to keep Sonic on the right track without any distractions, "that was my goal....but, after seeing the circumstances of your behavior I decided that perhaps it was best to wait. What does the crown have anything to do with the BOY you slept with?"

Now was the chance for Sonic to upright and say it while he maintained his mother's attention, "I...love him..." he managed to squeeze out of himself.

Aleena grew deathly quiet as she widened her eyes, the last thing she ever expected to hear from her own son was that he loved another boy, not to mention, a boy such as Shadow.

"Mom, there is a reason why Shadow is who he is and it's because of his father. His father RAPES him, every day without fail. When you sent him away, his father found him, abused him and raped him some more. All because of you, because you couldn't stand the thought of your son in bed with a boy let alone a boy that was of lower class than anybody to walk the planet. You can hate me and Shadow all you want but, I love him and I want to protect him from anything possible. I want to be by his side when he starts to show me his true feelings much rather than covering them up. I'm the only one that can help him and he's the only one that can help me."

She never asked him what he meant by that, she knew that Sonic's childhood wasn't easy for him. Having no friends, not intending a public school, instead a private tutor was hired to teach Sonic everything he knew today, even the stress of learning everything he needed to know about ruling an entire country it's no wonder why Sonic wanted to spend more time having fun than training or learning. It was just in his personality. Up from the time he was born, Aleena restrained him from anything other than royal standards that is why she never let him leave the palace's walls, she was afraid of what Sonic would find outside of the walls. There was a lot of horrible things outside and she never wanted Sonic to get caught up in all of it but, in reality, murder, rape, theft, it was all part of humanity. Perhaps she had no right of trying to hide all the horrible things in the world.

"You taught me a lot...and maybe I do have a long way to go before I can handle the crown but, meeting Shadow has changed me a lot. I see the world in another way other than being pure and peaceful and, because of him, he taught me that I want to put an end to the Black Market. I want to save everybody that is suffering from rape and abuse," as he spoke, his muscles loosened in his hands and he stared at his mother with begging, pleading eyes, "please...you have no idea how much suffering he was forced to endure and I love him so much."

"What options are you giving me here?" she asked him.

"Either you let me stay with him or I'll forfeit the crown and leave with him."

Another sigh from Aleena as she pretty much felt cornered by her son's blackmail, 'he's not leaving open much of a window, is he? Well...he is just like his father, so determined to get what he wants. After everything that I put him through maybe I should let him at least have this one favor...it's not like he comes to me often asking for things. And...he does seem to really love this guy if he's willing to give up everything to be with him. In the end, this whole thing IS my fault, as I was the one whom got pissed off because Sonic was fucking another boy without even obtaining the whole story,' she stared into her son's eyes and could see the determination from him, "I suppose...that's fine....but, you are aware that when you are offered the crown, if you do chose by then that he's someone you're staying with for your entire life, he will be given the crown as well. Normally that's not how it works since I was in an arranged marriage and that's what was planned for you but, your heart is already set out on this guy so it's to late to change what has already become."

Sonic's eyes widened when he heard what his mother had said, did she just seriously OK everything?

"So...I'm...allowed to stay with Shadow?" he asked her again and she nodded slowly, still a little unsure if the decision she made was for the best.

Fighting back tears of joy, he smiled warmly and simply nodded, "thank you, mom," he said and ran back upstairs. He was really excited to see Shadow.

Aleena blinked, was Shadow back in the palace again?

Sonic dashed into the room, but quickly stopped to try and act normal much rather than a crazed child. He headed towards the bed and gently touched Shadow's back while trying to be careful to not conflict with the burn.

Shadow twitched and his eyes opened, "S-Sonic..." he mumbled, half asleep while turning around to face the azure prince.

Sonic smiled warmly, a hand went to his ebony lover's cheek, "you can stay..."

That now meant he could keep his promise to shadow in protecting him but, when the time came for the crown, there was no way he was going to make Shadow take the stress of receiving that crown as well. He was going to allow Shadow to do what he wanted, to at least live a normal life. He deserved that much. Sonic was use to the pressures of living the life in royalty so for him to take in even more of the stress didn't seem to bother him one bit especially since now he was able to accomplish what he wanted to do ever since he met Shadow and that was to take down the Black Market.

"Stay?" Shadow questioned while still fighting away the drowsiness.

A nod from the prince as he gently positioned his body on top of the ebony. Their hands joined, Sonic brought his lips to Shadow for a deep, passionate kiss.

Year later...

Staring in a mirror, Sonic adjusted his outfit as he got ready for the big day. After the last year being filled with hard work and training, Sonic was now Eighteen and ready to accept the crown he had never desired to take until the day fate brought him to a tormented soul. It took a little bit, but Aleena had adjusted quite well to the ebony hedgehog's presence (probably because once Sonic had explained to her everything he been through since his existence started, she pretty much started to treat him rather well.)

Shadow, on the other hand, was still quiet. The good news though, was that he started to trust Sonic more and showed him more of his feelings than he did to anyone else though there still was the problem that he would not cry.

Knuckles got his job back inside the palace, Sonic had somehow managed to convince Aleena to bring him back since Knuckles was his first friend. Once he came back, they met amends and Knuckles explained to Sonic that the reason why it took him so long to find Shadow was because the Black Market refused to show him the documents until after awhile they caved and told him the address of Shadow's father.

Shadow's father was apprehended a few weeks after Shadow's rescue and all the 'slaves' from the Black Market was taken and given a place to stay. Sonic managed to succeed in doing this, but he knew that there was more slave trading going on out there. His father was charged with over 20 counts of rape, over 20 counts of molestation, false imprisonment, torture, and murder of Shadow's mother. so Sonic hoped that this would allow some peace in mind for his love.

Sighing, Sonic fixated his outfit again before finally getting it the way he wanted it, "alright....only 10 minutes left..." he was nervous.

There was a knock on the door and he turned around, "come in," he said. When the door opened, Shadow walked in. Immediately, a warm smile arrived on Sonic's pale lips, "hey..." he tenderly spoke while walking over to him, "you look good, you clean up nicely."

Shadow didn't know what to say as he simply nodded, "umm...thanks..." he said in a low tone, there were still many things he was adjusting to.

Blue chuckled as he ran a hand across Shadow's cheek, "I'm serious, your bizarre sense in clothes makes you look really nice."

This was true, Shadow was the type of person that would wear tight jeans with one side like shorts and the other side like pants, then, wear a skin tight long sleeved shirt with slits down the arms. Sonic figured that he did this simply because he had just always worn torn clothes and is something that stuck with him.

"Amy did your spines, huh?" Sonic questioned him.

He slowly nodded.

Since Shadow's father had him for that period of time, his body was damaged from scars, his spines were damaged, and he was skinny. But Amy had fixed up his spines, allowed them to grow back so that they looked normal and healthy again, he gained the weight he needed and still managed to maintain his figure.

"You're perfect..." Sonic whispered, dazed by Shadow's appearance.

"Thanks..." he replied shyly, staring at the ground.

"Hey...look at me..." he ordered softly while caressing his cheek. Shadow obeyed, "don't worry, nobody will hurt you..."

Nodding again, Shadow knew he was safe, but that didn't stop him from being paranoid whenever he heard someone call him 'perfect.'

Chuckling gently, he kissed Shadow's cheek before pulling his hand away, "well, I best head down. I'll see you at dinner. Hope you enjoy the show."

Gradually, a warm smile appeared on Shadow's lips and he nodded, "I will...good luck."

Heading out the door, sonic stopped in his tracks and faced the ebony counterpart, "Shadow...I love you."

"I love you, too."

Smiling again, Sonic started to walk again down the stairs. It was just as Sonic suspected, the two of them getting together and protecting each other stopped the suffering for the both of them. Sonic could give Shadow the future he always wanted and Shadow could give Sonic what he wanted, somebody to love, cherish and protect with everything he had in him.

And he would never stop protecting him.

The End.