Shadow And Silver
“Shadow, you don’t get it, do you.”
“Arasaka’s not a corporation, it’s black hole with a logo. Shit sucking the life from any unlucky soul breaching its horizon. They don’t buy loyalty, they grow it in vats, barcode it, and weaponize it. Every giant ugly skyscraper they erect is a fuck you to the entire earth. They’re daring it to shake ’em down, cocky fucks think they control the movement of the plates. Arasaka doesn’t bleed when you cut it, it files a patent on the knife and buys your silence. Every shadow they cast has teeth, and every light they shine burns through your skin like a magnifying glass to an ant. Every product they sell a leash, and every upgrade is another link in the chain.”
Shadow’s eyes widened as Johnny’s words stuck to him like a glue wet gun.
“Silverhand. This isn’t about Arasaka, I’m hungry.”
Silverhand adjourned the ground with a fresh coat of spit.
The glare knifed through the air, slicing into shadows eye. Shadow twisted, one gloved hand snapping up instinctively. The chrome flash of Silverhands shades threw back the light, the hate curdling inside him. “Arasaka’s food isn’t fast. It’s instant, because waiting doesn’t make a profit. You ever read the label on the side? It’s a contract, and you signed it the second you took a bite. Every meal comes with a free side of indoctrination, paired perfectly to those fucked corpo shit head’s crazy ideas. They don’t just serve food Shadow, they serve compliance, garnished with engineered false satisfaction.”
Silverhand moved with a rage in each gesture, his hands moving in time with the timer his heart set to bring himself to a boil. Shadow moved his hand from its protective position to Silverhand’s side. His muscles impressing upon Shadow power.
“Corpo’s, wars . . . Chaos. It’s all just shadows on the wall from here. I don’t chase shadows Johnny, I embody them.” He said.
Shadow locked his gloved hand with the metal of his partner’s namesake. Cold in defiance to the red hot rage brewing inside filled the air between pleather and chrome.
Shadow spoke with determination and care. “For someone screaming about freedom, you sure love hearing your own chains rattle. Your revolutions got style Silverhand. But I’ve got speed. I’ve got chaos. We don’t need anything else.”
Silverhand swallowed his rival’s brain stained intrusion for a moment. Silverhand caught the striking reflection of his chrome glaring in his chooms bright widened eyes.
“Shadow. Every second I don’t vaporize that fucking shit stain of an eye sore Arasaka put on this once great city, was only granted cause you’re smack dab in middle of the blast radius. You stop running, Shadow, and Araska’s gunna find out what nuclear regret tastes like.”
Shadow turned to the friendly Nippon worker dressed in full chao outfit. “One more water please, to go.”
“Hai.” The chao retreated to the kitchen.
“Alright Silverhand. I’m in. But we’re doing it my way. It’s my way or the highway, and no highway on earth can carve a path faster to chaos than me.”
“I never knew I’d ever love someone as much as I hate those corpo Arasaka rats.”
“Love?”
Silverhand let go of plush gloved mitts, seizing Shadow’s now pursed lips in a desperate pull towards his own. Their hearts let out the explosive energy of a-thousand tactical nuclear bombs exploding all at once in the heart of Arasaka’s domain.
Every second they spent in that first kiss, would leave them another week an addict to each others dark and brooding embrace. Shadow pulled back first. He removed Silverhand’s shades with his love shaken gloved hand like paw. “Shadow. . . I haven’t taken these off in years.”
Shadow’s bright beading eyes pierced Johnny’s now exposed hazed brown glass panes. “I needed to see how beautiful you could be. . . when your heart was at rest. I swear to you, Silverhand. Arasaka will know our chaos.”
They got up to leave. The chao cried out “Your water, Shadow the Hedgehog.” Silverhand’s eyes lit up “Keep it. Hydrate the next poor hopeless bastard who thinks they can live under Arasaka’s thumb.”