#shadamy week 2022 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

w0lp3rtinger · 2 years

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The Home You Make

SHADAMY WEEK 2022 IS HERE! The first prompt was Future/Fankids. @lambpaca and I had made Gigi a while ago, but I never had the opportunity to write about her... UNTIL NOW!

Once again, I am challenging myself to try and do these prompts within the day. I overthink and over-edit a LOT and it really hampers my ability to just... have fun and make art. So yeah, that's my little personal challenge for this week💜

---

“You good?”

Amy folded her hands atop the pile of pictures in front of her, watching as Shadow’s grip on a photograph tightened. She poked her head over his shoulder to see a set of dour eyes, much too old for their owner, looking up at her from the picture.

“Oh, well doesn’t she look serious. Which one is she?”

He flipped the picture over. Amy squinted at the cramped handwriting on the back.

“‘Gigi, age 7. Parakeet.’ She’s a little older than the others.”

Shadow moved his thumb out of the way, and Amy cupped her hand around his to bring the photo closer to her face.

“‘Though shy and standoffish, Gigi is a sweet kid who enjoys books, drawing, and nature. She can often be found up a tree and in her own little world…’ Wait a minute, where’s the rest? Is that all it says?” Amy flipped a picture of a baby beaver over, revealing a lengthy paragraph of information. “That’s a lot shorter than the other descriptions.”

Amy looked between the mass of photos on the table and the one clenched in Shadow’s hand, between the smiling, babbling babies and this stony-faced little girl.

Amy started to drag her nails back and forth between Shadow’s shoulder blades.

“I’ve never worked with feathers before, but I can ask Tekno to teach me.”

Shadow raised a brow at that.

“What? Don’t give me that look, I’m just thinking ahead!”

She watched as Shadow fought back a smile, “You like her too, then?”

“She is a cutie,” Amy sighed, “Like, I know she’s trying to be serious in this photo, but she still looks so sweet.”

“She pouts like you do.”

“I do not pout.”

“Yes, you absolutely do.”

“Shut up!” Amy laughed as she hit him playfully, “Augh, but seriously, she’s adorable. How has she not been adopted yet?”

Shadow shrugged, “Probably something to do with her being ‘shy and standoffish.’”

“That’s a shame to be passed over just for that,” Amy sighed as she took the photo from Shadow, “Wonder how long she’s been there.”

“...We should meet her.”

Amy shot him a look. “For real?”

Shadow finally turned to face Amy. There was a look in his eye that she had come to recognize over the years, one that glinted in the light from the lamp above their kitchen table.

It always spelled out trouble, but trouble that was worth it.

They sat there for a moment, watching one another, until he turned his attention once again to that severe stare.

“Yes.”

Amy kissed his temple gently, burying a smile there. “I’ll call in the morning then and set up an appointment.”

“I can do it.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh wow, seems like she already made an impression on you.”

She could feel him chuckle, the shaking of his shoulders giving him away.

---------

“You’re the couple here to meet Gigi?”

“That is correct.”

Amy watched as the zebra, who had introduced herself as Crystal, looked between herself and Shadow. She couldn’t help but rock on the balls of her feet, excited even as she held Shadow’s hand in a death grip. The adoption agent pursed her lips as she pulled her clipboard closer. While she flipped through papers, Shadow turned to look around the playground they stood in, watching as kids ran around them screaming. There were kids on swings, kids playing with chalk, kids chasing one another.

Amy practically vibrated with the energy. One of those kids out there might like them, might want to be their’s.

She was smiling so much it practically hurt.

“Did they give you any extra information when you called?”

“Should they have?” Amy stopped rocking, cocking her head, “I mean, I wasn’t there for the conversation between your secretary and my husband, but by the way you’re acting, it sounds like something is wrong-”

“No no no, you misunderstand, nothing is ‘wrong,’” Crystal held up a hand, “It’s just Gigi is a bit of a special case and, um, well, she’s a bit… stubborn.”

Amy and Shadow shared a look.

“We like stubborn,” said Shadow.

“I, um,” the lady pursed her lips for a moment, “She’s difficult.”

Amy laughed at that, “We don’t mind difficult.”

“I don’t- I don’t think you quite understand what I am trying to say…” The woman shook her head, her eyes not quite meeting Amy. “Why don’t you both come in and we can discuss this in further detail.”

There was a heavy pause. Amy turned to look at Shadow as he scanned the treeline on the other side of the playground near where some kids were playing with a ball.

“Hey,” Amy muttered, leaning towards him as she did so. Shadow didn’t turn, but she saw an ear twitch in her direction as she continued, “Even if this doesn’t go the way we hope it does, we’re still adopting from this agency, right?”

“Unless they royally fuck it up, which they might.”

Amy could hear Crystal huff, indignant. She shook her head, “But if they don’t.”

“If they don’t, then yes, I’m comfortable sticking with this place.”

“Okay,” Amy squeezed his hand, “Why don’t you go and say hello. I’ll handle some of the preliminary paperwork.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.”

Shadow turned to face her then, and again, she saw that look in his eyes. Without another word, he brought their clasped hands up to his lips to kiss her knuckles before walking off towards a pinetree.

“Wait- sir-!”

“He’ll be fine,” Amy said, putting an arm around the zebra and steering her towards the front door, “You have playground monitors out here, he’ll be supervised. Now, why don’t we go to your office and you can fill me in about Gigi.”

“But-”

“My husband will join us in a bit, don’t you worry. I’d say… give it about an hour, two at most.”

---------

Shadow made a beeline for the tree, making sure to not look at it, but rather, towards the game the kids were playing just to the side. He found himself rotating his inhibitors slowly around his wrists as he tried to quell the shaking in his hands.

Focus. Deep breaths. He could do this.

Something hit his leg. Looking down, he found a tiny crocodile toddler had grabbed onto him. They blinked their large eyes as they proceeded to stick their free hand into their mouth and suck on their fingers. With a huff, Shadow bent down and picked them up.

“And who are you?”

The toddler grunted.

“Nice to meet you. Don’t suppose you know where the person watching you is supposed to be, do you?” he mumbled as the babe proceeded to grab onto his chest.

The crocodile took the hand out of its mouth only to babble.

“Yeah, that’s sort of what I was thinking happened.”

With that, he felt another little hand grab onto his other leg, and he sighed.

---------

“She’s from Christmas Island.”

Crystal handed Amy a stack of papers from across the desk, and she took a deep breath. It was thick. Thick stacks of papers, Amy had learned, were never a good sign. The agent leaned back in her chair as she picked up a thermos from a coaster on the table.

“She’s been with us a few years, but even so, it’s been difficult for her to adjust. Eggman did a lot of damage to that place. We don’t really make that public information because obviously we want her to find a loving home, but we also don’t want people to be surprised either.”

“No I understand,” Amy said as she flipped through the top pages. “Have you, um, have you taken her to see anyone? A psychologist or anything?”

“There’s a counselor that comes by once a month. He works with a lot of the orphanages and adoption agencies in the area. That’s about as good as we can do.”

Amy looked up. “I see,” she said, but as she was about to continue her sentence, she could see through the window behind Crystal as Shadow stumbled by with children hanging off of him towards a pair of caretakers. She bit her lip and looked back down at the paperwork in her hands as she tried not to laugh.

Crystal took a sip. “I will tell you, she doesn’t really talk to adults much. Mr. Wrigler couldn’t really get her to open up at all. The other kids say she talks, but, well, you know kids.”

She chuckled. Amy nodded, refusing to look up again even as she heard a kid start screaming outside, no doubt pried from Shadow’s chest fur.

“It seems like she gets into a number of fights.”

“Yes,” the agent nodded, “That has been a problem.”

“Can you tell me more about that?”

The lady sighed. “Well, she’s good with the little ones, but she can get really obstinate and is constantly at odds with adults. She’s also been in a few foster situations, but we found that she wasn’t really getting along well with other people…”

“So she’d be brought back.”

“Yes… Ah, ma’am, pardon me, but what is your husband doing?”

Amy looked up to see Crystal leaning back in her chair and looking out the window just behind her. Outside, Amy could see Shadow, finally free of clinging hands, climbing one of the trees he had his eye on earlier.

“Oh, uh,” Amy looked between her disappearing husband and the adoption agent who was now giving her a withering look, “That’s normal.”

---------

Shadow sighed as he settled onto a branch about halfway up the pine. Shaking leaves and twigs from his quills, he leaned against the trunk and turned his gaze towards the sky.

Gigi, sitting a good distance away on an opposite branch, stayed silent.

Below them, the toddlers had forgotten all about Shadow’s existence and had gone back to their games. He watched the crocodile babe, still red-eyed from being pried off, sit and sulk as he chewed on a tricycle handlebar. Beyond the walls of the orphanage hummed the city. Houses of worship called out for their acolytes as cars blew through redlights, and corner stores let their music and air conditioning pool out onto the sidewalk. Somewhere, someone was playing music to dance to. Somewhere, someone was arguing over an unpaid tab. Within the branches was a bubble, but everything that existed out there could be seen, could be heard, could be known.

The kid had good taste. This was an excellent spot.

Shadow stretched, letting his fingers hook around a branch above him as he popped his shoulder joints with a yawn.

His hand snapped out and caught the pinecone a hair’s breadth from his face. Gigi, her arm still outstretched from throwing it, pailed. Shadow could hear her suck in a quiet gasp.

He clicked his tongue as he tossed the pinecone between his hands.

“Throw with your wrist.” Shadow said, not looking at her. “Harder to notice.”

He threw the pinecone back towards her. Not too fast, but just fast enough to make her jump and scramble to catch it. Shadow smiled as he watched her practice from the corner of his eye, her brow furrowed as she tried to mimic him. After a moment, she threw it again, but instead of going towards him, it hit the trunk of the tree and fell to the grass below.

Gigi froze.

Wordlessly, Shadow reached out, away from her, and pulled another pinecone off the tree. He tossed it to her more gently than before.

“Try again.”

---------

“I believe you said in the questionnaire that any child you adopt would be your first child, is that correct?”

Amy looked up, pen hovering over the paperwork she had signed her name on ten times already. “Yes.”

“And you finished the required coursework to adopt from us?” Crystal took a sip from her thermos again.

Amy took a deep breath, sitting upright in her chair even as the adoption agent scrutinized her. “Yes. We actually finished it the same day we received it. I have copies of the certificate of completion if you need to see them.”

“No no, I won’t need to see them until you actually select a child for adoption.”

Amy took another deep breath, working overtime to keep the smile from slipping off her face, “I thought that this meeting today was sort of the start for that process, unless Gigi says no, of course.”

Crystal said nothing. There was no need to elaborate upon the sympathetic look she gave. Amy felt the plastic of the pen start to crack in her hands.

“I get the feeling that you think we’ve put our faith in the wrong kid,” she said, her voice bright and cheerful even as she grit her teeth.

Crystal seemed to falter at that, sitting up straighter as she placed her thermos upon the table. “No, not at all, it’s just- well, you wouldn’t be the first people to be put off by her after meeting her.”

“I understand that,” Amy said as she waved a hand, “But you seem pretty set on the fact that this kid is doomed from the start no matter what she does.”

“Well, no-”

“But you keep trying to tell me that my husband and I have made a mistake in trying to meet her, let alone adopt her.”

“That’s because-”

“She’s shy and standoffish, or stubborn and difficult, or whatever, I heard you.”

“Yes, and-”

“And she gets in fights, and she doesn’t talk to people, and she doesn’t handle authority well.” Amy leaned across the desk, “What I don’t think you understand is that we don’t care. We can work with that. If she doesn’t like us, that’s one thing, but I would really-” the pen broke in Amy’s hand, “-really recommend you stop selling this kid short and stop trying to change our minds for us, alright? Think you can do that? Because I’d love it if you could do that.”

The adoption agent nodded frantically, leaning so far back that her chair had begun to lift off of it’s front legs. Amy sighed as she sat back in her own chair, tossing the now demolished pen into the trash can as she plucked another from the holder just next to Crystal's name plate.

Amy cast a glance at the clock on the wall. “They should be wrapping up about now,” she mumbled as she bent back over the stack of papers.

---------

Gigi was grinning ear to ear, and Shadow couldn’t help but do the same.

“You’re getting good at this,” he said as he tossed the pinecone back to her.

She giggled, holding up the pinecone to cover her mouth as she kicked her legs. Shadow laughed a little himself as he watched her. This was fun. This was more than fun, it was- he didn’t know what it was, but something seemed to have come over him like a warm sheet, light and fuzzy and slightly electric.

He could have done it forever if she wanted him to. The only thing that would have made the moment better was if Amy were here, but if everything went right…

The thought made him dizzy. He braced himself against the tree as he shook his head to focus, and like the little devil she was, the kid took the advantage. Without warning, Gigi snapped her wrist and the pinecone hit Shadow right in the face.

Gigi gasped, freezing in place. Shadow spat pieces of pinecone from his mouth as he opened one eye only to see horror had overtaken her joy.

Well he wasn’t having that.

With a dramatic groan, he let himself swing backwards, hanging by his knees as his arms dangled over his head. “You got me. I have been gotten. I relinquish… my title… of ultimate pinecone thrower…to you.”

Gigi cackled, little warbling squawks punctuating her laughter like exclamation points. Shadow pulled himself back up to find her wrapping her arms around herself as she leaned into the tree. For a moment, they both stayed there, giggling with their backs to the prickly bark and their eyes turned towards the sky. Then, Gigi pointed.

“That cloud looks like a hermit crab.”

Shadow caught his gasp just in time, breathing in deeply instead. Hands shaking, he gripped the branch beneath him tighter as he looked towards the cloud she was pointing at.

“You’re right,” he nodded, “It does look like a hermit crab.”

“I love hermit crabs.”

“They are pretty cool.”

“Yeaaah.”

“What do you love most about hermit crabs?”

Shadow heard shuffling and the creek of wood. Turning, he found Gigi sliding from her branch over to his and into his lap. Shadow leaned into the trunk to balance himself as Gigi looked up at him.

---------

“So you’re Gigi!” Amy clasped her hand in excitement. “It’s so nice to meet you!”

Gigi gave Amy the side eye, turning in towards Shadow who held her close in one arm. The little girl kept clenching and unclenching his chest fur as she looked Amy up and down.

Crystal sighed, rolling her eyes. “Gigi, did you hear-”

“She doesn’t have to talk if she doesn’t want to.” Amy snapped.

Gigi gasped in surprise as she stared at Amy. Shadow chuckled as rubbed her back with his free hand. A maternal instinct like no other welled up in Amy, and it took everything in her power not to squeal.

“Did you two have fun up in the tree?”

Shadow nodded. “We hung out and played catch with a pinecone. Then, she told me all the things she loves about hermit crabs.”

“Oo! Hermit crabs are very cool!”

“They’re her favorite animal.”

“Are they? Oh wow, it takes a lot to be a favorite. What do you love about hermit crabs.”

Gigi looked at Shadow, then back at Amy. Her breathing picked up, slowly at first, then faster, faster, until she was practically gasping and shaking. Suddenly, she reached out and grabbed for Amy, throwing herself off balance. Shadow used his free hand to support her as Amy moved closer, catching Gigi’s hand in her own and allowing herself to be pulled in until it was just the three of them, faces close.

“Everything,” Gigi whispered, “I love everything.”

Amy’s heart snapped open. Looking between them, she saw a look, so striking and so similar it took her breath away.

It always spelled out trouble, but trouble that was worth it, and this was absolutely going to be worth it. NOTE: I believe in retrospect I might have been subconsciously inspired by my friend @shadamyheadcanons and their work: A Rosie Outlook. Please go give them some love, and make sure to check out their amazing stories!

#shadamy week 2022 #shadow the hedgehog #amy rose #shadamy #gigi the parakeet #library #sonic #sth #sega #adoption #gigi

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