Shadow's Wild Chapter 3

As days and weeks passed, Shadow found his thoughts and time increasingly occupied with Sonic. They began to establish a comfortable routine. When he had finished his social obligations and his duties with the company and household, Shadow would bring Sonic his dinner after dark, when the wild was awake, and spend about an hour or so with the creature, watching him as he consumed his meal. Shadow despised wearing the turtlenecks required for their visits, but he was willing to deal with it for an hour a day.

Sonic would always leap down from the trees and bound over to greet him when he entered, full of toothy grins and welcomes, and he would embrace and nuzzle the surly businessman like a loving dog or cat. After that came the mandatory grooming session. Shadow put up with his attentions because he found the creature fascinating, and wanted to alter his natural habits and behavior as little as possible.

Often they would merely sit in comfortable silence. Sonic attempted to entertain him by pointing out the actions of the butterflies and the fish in the pond, and would purr strange, low humming melodies. Sometimes the wild would try to impress him with his agility in the trees, and by demonstrating how he could coax the birds to come and sit on his hand (which Shadow had to admit, was impressive– he had expected the birds to be terrified of such a large and potentially dangerous creature).

Sonic would still try for his wrist, wishing that he could communicate more directly with him, but Shadow unwaveringly refused any of the wild's mind-touching. He still found it highly disturbing to hear the voice of another person inside his head; it made him feel schizophrenic, and exposed.

Almost a week after the blue male's arrival, however, Shadow inadvertently made a serious breach of etiquette. He strode into the greenhouse after a long day, still full of corporate bustle and vigor. Sonic leapt down to greet him as usual, and was surprised that he had not brought dinner, but instead carried a small leather bag. He peered curiously at it and looked at his master, his eyes full of questions.

The offending item happened to be a doctor's bag. Shadow hadn't been able to stop worrying about the possibility of hellish tropical diseases spreading from the creature, even if he appeared clean, and had decided to take some preventive action.

"Dinner later, Sonic. I want to vaccinate you first. Nothing personal, but who knows what you've brought back from those backwater jungles. You're bound to have worms too, and you probably don't even know it. God, I hate worms!"

Sonic shook his head to tell Shadow that he was devoid of ghastly flesh-eating diseases and uninvited creepy crawlies, but the ebony male wasn't listening. While he prepared the injection, Sonic sniffed distastefully at the tiny ampoules of medicine and at the hypodermic, frowning deeply. He gingerly attempted to touch the tip of the needle.

"Hey, don't touch that!" Shadow admonished, jerking the needle away from him. "You'll contaminate it, it's supposed to be sterile. Now don't worry, I know what I'm doing. I got this stuff from our veterinarian; had him show me how to give shots. I told him it was for our thoroughbred racehorses, heh. See, this one bottle is a new kind of general de-worming agent and the second is an antibiotic."

Shadow swabbed a spot on his furry arm with alcohol, sucked up both medications with the hypo and tapped the side like a pro, then pressed the plunger until a few drops were expelled from the needle. Sonic crinkled his nose and made faces at the smell, watching him uneasily.

"Okay, ready to go. Hold still, this will just take a second..." And with one quick motion he thrust the needle fully into the unsuspecting wild's upper arm. Shadow had assumed it would be so easy, just a simple task over within five minutes. However...

"GYAAAHH!!!"

Sonic jolted away in a panic, knocking Shadow over in his haste and scattering medical accouterments everywhere. He flew up into the nearest tall tree and perched at the top, his quills standing up like a spooked cat, as he hissed and snarled like mad.

Shadow picked himself up off the ground. "Chaos! Darn it, I didn't even get a chance to inject the vaccine." He took one look at the indignant, puffed up wild in the tree and burst out laughing.

"Why you big, giant baby, it's only a little needle! Some tough guy you are!!!" he exclaimed. Sonic let out a furious deep growl and threw down bark, branches, leaves, hard fruit, and finally the hypodermic, pelting Shadow with missiles until he ran out of the greenhouse, still snickering madly at the whole ordeal.