//------------------------------//
// Date Night 
// Story: Dear Maria, 
// by CalmHeart 
//------------------------------//

Dear Maria,

The work week's been pretty long winded and draining for me. Investigations have slowed, and everyone at the office is getting pretty tense.

Well, they would be, if Rouge hadn't announced my proposing to Pinkie. Everyone's been congratulating me and it's been kind of annoying. But I guess you'd be right there with them too, huh?

I need to get out more with Pinks, do stuff together. She's told me it's been frantic with her work too, and I think we both deserve a break.

Love,
Shadow



It's been a busy work week for Pinkie Pie, as the start of summer brought many parties to be hosted, the Cake twins were old enough to be sent to daycare, and the Cakes were making plans to expand their catering business.

Pinkie and Shadow had announced their engagement two weeks ago, and everypony was buzzing with the news and future plans. But for now, everything went on as usual.

In the kitchen, Pinkie was helping Ms. Cake decorate a lollipop fixture while Mr. Cake was preparing cupcake frostings.
"Should the concessions be at the Castle of Friendship, or should it be in Ponyville park?"

Pinkie answered Ms. Cake's question while placing a bundle of blue swirl pops into their place. "We're not really sure yet. What me and Shady do know, is that we want to have an outdoor wedding."

Mr. Cake poured some frosting into a piping bag to be used for later. "Who's shopping for the rings?"

Pinkie Pie answered with enthusiasm. "We wanted to do that together, maybe with Rarity or Rouge. Actually, we could get them to go spelunking with us to find some jewels so we could get custom made."

"Sounds like you have a lot on your plate." Mr. Cake noted. Ms. Cake stepped back from the fixture, and pondered what colors to place next.

Pinkie nodded. "Yeah. Shady too, including all he has to deal with at his job in his world."

When they finished the fixture, Pinkie trotted over to the stairs.
"I'm going down to the party cave to plan some wedding things."

Ms. Cake set the lollipop fixture aside, moving on to the next task.
"Okay, dear, just don't tire yourself out. Take a break."

Pinkie bounced up the stairs, finishing the conversation.
"I know, I will."



Shadow sighed exhaled heavily as he entered Sugarcube Corner. It was evening, and he was still wearing his denim office jacket. This one had the GUN logo stitched onto the right shoulder.

The Cake twins were playing with their parents in the front, and Shadow smiled slightly at the scene.

Mr. Cake noticed him first. "Hello, Shadow."

The twins got excited to see Shadow.
"Unkl Shady!"

They trotted up to him quickly, and Shadow lightly chuckled at their cheeriness. He bent down to let them hug him.

"Hello little ones."

"How was your day?" Ms. Cake stood as Shadow stood. He started walking across the room.

"A little more than exhausting." Shadow answered honestly.

"Pinkie's downstairs working on wedding preparations." Mr. Cake let Shadow know as Shadow walked behind the counter.

"Can you tell her we've already fed the twins?" Ms. Cake asked.

Shadow began walking up the stairs. "Got it."

"Oh, and one more thing."

Shadow momentarily stopped and glanced at Ms. Cake.

"Tell her to come upstairs. I haven't seen her this busy in a while."

He nodded, and climbed the stairs.

..

Shadow's feet landed on the ground of the party cave with a hard thump.

"Knock Knock."

Pinkie was going through a box when she heard him speak. She looked up to him, smiling.

"Hi Shady. How was it?"

Pinkie bounced over to him and they shared a hug as he spoke.
"Very, very tiresome. I don't think I want to look at another document again."

Pinkie giggled, both sharing a quick kiss before Pinkie trotted back over to the box.
"So I was thinking, what theme should we go with?"

"I thought we would go with just a traditional wedding?" Shadow walked over to her as she turned back to him.

"Well, isn't that kinda boring? I want this to be the best wedding it can be!"

Shadow nodded, sighing lightly.
"I know, I know you do. I want you to be happy."

Pinkie chuckled. "Don't forget about yourself Shady, I want this to be the best experience for you too."

That made him smile.

"For the both of us."

Pinkie pushed away the box and turned her attention to him.

"So how was your day?" Shadow asked, putting a hand on her head, petting her mane.

Pinkie giggled lightly, but sighed. "Less busy than the last few days, but still pretty packed."

He sighed to himself.
"We've both been a lot busier."

"You can say that again."

For a minute both of them were silent.

Shadow suddenly had an idea. "Hey, you doing anything this evening?"

Pinkie shook her head. "Nope." She suddenly gasped happily. "You wanna go do something together?"

Shadow gave a small grin.
"Stole the thought right out of my head."

Pinkie got excited, and started to jump around. "Oh where should we go? What should we do?" She stopped abruptly, remembering something. "Wait, I have to feed the twins first."

Shadow pointed back at the slide.
"Ms. Cake got it covered. Looks like we're both free."

Pinkie stretched a hoof around his shoulder. "Soooo? What do we wanna do?"

Shadow thought for a minute, before having an idea.

"Well, we need to do something fun, but not too exhilarating. Do you want to do something here, or in my world?"

Pinkie was pleasantly surprised.

"Outside of your work?"

Shadow shrugged.
"Eh, it, couldn't hurt. I don't think it would be too much trouble."

Pinkie squeed happily, giving him a side hug. "Yay! Do you have a place in mind?"

Shadow nodded.

"As a matter of fact, I do. Do you like to roller skate?"

Pinkie gasped, smiling. "I love to!"

Shadow quickly chaos snapped the two of them to Pinkie's room, bottom floor.

"Go get your roller skates. I don't think they'll have any in your size."

Pinkie excitedly trotted to her closet, and came back with her white and purple roller skates. She yelled down the stairs.

"Mr. and Ms. Cake! Shady and I are going out!"

Ms. Cake's voice travelled up the stairs.
"Alright dear, you two have fun! Just come back before midnight!"

Pinkie held out her hoof to Shadow, and he teleported them directly to the mirror portal.
"Hey, you're getting good at far distances." Pinkie complimented.

Shadow concurred. "Yeah, but I don't think I'll be able to snap directly to my Earth. Way too long of a distance."

"You'd need a Chaos Emerald for that?" Pinkie guessed.

They both walked to the portal as Shadow answered.
"Sure. If I wanted to go from Ponyville to Canterlot in one teleportation, I'd need a chaos emerald for that too."

"Oh, that's very interesting!"



The two conversated casually as they walked out of Tails' workshop. Shadow was given a key by Tails to his workshop, so Shadow could use the portal whenever he needed.

Outside, Shadow had parked his motorcycle. Pinkie Pie smiled, trotting up to the bike. "Nice shine!"

Shadow got out his keys, walking up to the bike.

"Sometimes I let Tails work with me on my motorcycle when it gets damaged or when it needs a tune-up. Recently he wanted to try out this polishing spray he bought online."

He turned to Pinkie. "Do you need a helmet?"

Pinkie shook her head, pulling out a helmet out of nowhere. "Nope! I got one right here!" She pulled her helmet over her head.

Shadow climbed onto his bike, and put the key in the ignition, turning it.
"Alrighty then. You remember how to ride with me?"

"Of course!" Pinkie hopped up behind him. She wrapped her hooves around his waist. "Squeeze onto you, and hold on tight!"

Shadow smiled a little, and kicked up the kickstand. They drove off to their destination.

..

Soon enough they pulled into the parking lot of a decently sized, retro building lit up by neon florescent tube lights, spelling out the word "SKATE".

Pinkie got excited, seeing the bright colorful lights.

"Oh wow!"

Shadow turned off the motorcycle, and put his keys in his jacket pocket.

Pinkie Pie got off the bike first, taking off her helmet.

"It looks like a lot of fun!"

"I knew you would say so." Shadow got off the bike, and took Pinkie's helmet from her, strapping it onto the bike.
"Now Pinks, remember the rules I told you about my workplace?"

She waited for him to finish so they could walk together. "Yeah?"

They walked side by side to the building.
"Those still apply. People in my world don't like to be randomly touched or annoyed by someone they don't know. They have less tolerance for it, I should say."

"Got it!"

Shadow opened the door for her, Pinkie walking in, and turning around to face as him as he walked in. "You know Shady, you should also remember we're here to have fun. Don't go all stoic on me because there's others around you."

Shadow let a small laugh. She was right.

"Okay, sure."

Shadow walked up to the vendor, taking out some cash from his wallet, and placing it down on the counter.
"Two skaters please."

The vendor didn't look twice, and cashed in the money. The vendor sounded tired. "You want a receipt?"

"No, thank you."

Shadow and Pinkie walked over to the doors to the indoor rink.

"What you're about to experience is remnants of a bygone era in human history. Still this place protists, even after all this time."

"So it's like we're going back in time?" Pinkie spoke excitedly.

"Well I wouldn't say that."

Shadow and Pinkie walked through the doors.

"They play modern pop songs over the speakers nowadays."

Pinkie Pie gasped in awe, her eyes and smile growing huge.

In front of them was a little food stand tucked onto the right wall, with a couple of hard plastic picnic tables and 2 person seating arrangements periodically placed. In the far right corner, was the skate rental counter, boxes upon shoes boxes lined the back wall in the rental, in all sorts of sizes. To the left of them, was a huge oval rink, half walls outlining the rink and keeping both the skaters and those not skating safe. A railing ran on the inside of the wall for beginners. Colorful lights spun down on the rink, while the music played.

Pinkie was getting more and more hyper. Shadow spoke to her.

"I have to go get a pair, so wait for me before going out into the ring."

Pinkie began trotting around as Shadow walked across the building to the skate rental.

As Shadow was getting his skates, Pinkie couldn't help it.
As Shadow grabbed his skates off the counter, he heard her shout happily.

"Woohoo!"

He abruptly turned around to see Pinkie had quickly made herself free on the rink, skates already on her hooves.

"Come on Shady, get out here!"

Shadow sighed quietly, hoping not to many people were staring. He walked over to a bench to take off his shoes.

"You just couldn't help yourself huh?" He spoke quietly under his breath, continuously glancing up at her.

Pinkie rolled up to the railing a few feet in front of the bench, and rested her front hooves on the wall. Somehow, Pinkie knew what he said. She beamed. "You know I can't! But you love that most about me right?"

Shadow silently chuckled, finishing lacing up the roller skates.

"You could say I tolerate it." Shadow put his air shoes away.

Pinkie chuckled back, and pushed herself away from the wall.

"Let's see if all that sliding around on air actually translates to a grounded pair of skates."

Shadow smirked, standing.
"I can't tell if you're challenging me or not."

Pinkie skated off.

"Well get out here, you're so slow!"

He gave another silent chuckle, and effortlessly glided out onto the court.

There were only a few people in the rink who weren't skating on the beginner railing before Pinkie had entered the ring, so the middle was pretty much left to her and Shadow.

Shadow skated with his hands folded behind his back. He watched Pinkie get a quick start, then jump elegantly into the air, landing back on the ground effortlessly, skating over to him.

"I never knew you were this good at roller skating Pinks." Shadow complemented her as she matched his picked up pace.

"I learned how to ice skate when I was a filly, so picking up roller skating was easy-peasy!"

"I can see that."

Pinkie started to skate in circles around Shadow as they talked. "Can you do any tricks?"

Shadow slowed. "I'm not sure. Probably, but I prefer to calmly skate around."

Pinkie stopped in front of him. "Well?..."

Shadow exhaled audibly, and smiled to her.

Quickly he skated to an empty spot on the wall rail and jumped up onto it, grinding a fair distance, and jumping back onto the ground. Pinkie excitedly skated over to him as he proceeded to skate backwards.

"Wow Shady, that was really impressive!"

"Nah, Not really." Shadow acted nonchalant about it.

"Where'd you learn to skate on rails like that?" Pinkie was curious.

Shadow glanced around, before looking back to her. "Don't tell anyone, but I learned by watching Sonic grind down rails shortly after I had awakened from stasis."

"Oh really?" Pinkie tilted her head slightly. Shadow gave a "mm-hm" and they were quiet for a moment.

Pinkie beamed, and raced off in front of him.

"First around the rink 3 times wins!"

Shadow silently chuckled, and followed after her.

The two had a fun time racing, dancing and skating around the rink, having the down time they needed. It was good to get out; even Shadow was letting his usual thick walls around the public fall, if for a moment.

After a long while on the rink, the two changed out their skates, and decided to get something at the snack stand.

"Do they have chocolate? I hope they have chocolate! Ooh! With whipped cream, and sprinkles, and-"

Shadow chuckled, interrupting her tangent. "Pinks, I'm sure they have it. Do you want to share one, or get two?"

"I want to share with you. I heard it's more romantic."

Shadow rolled his eyes, smiling.

They walked up to the counter, and a red armadillo wearing a blank white apron came to the counter. He recognized Shadow.

"Shadow the hedgehog, I'd never thought I'd see you here without Rouge."

"Well, it was a spontaneous choice." Shadow lightly nudged Pinkie's side with his elbow.

Mighty the Armadillo gave the pink mare a welcoming grin."Oh? And who's this special lady? I've seen you two absolutely tear up the rink tonight."

Pinkie giggled. "My name's Pinkie Pie! And, believe it or not, cause you might not at first, I'm Shady's fiancé!"

"Really?" Mighty blinked in surprise.

"Yeah, we get that a lot." Shadow admitted.

Mighty was quiet for a second before remembering something. "Oooh, you must be the mare Rouge told me about."

Shadow sighed in annoyance. "She told you too?"

"Actually, she told the rest of the team, and they told me."

"Team?" Pinkie grew curious.

They suddenly heard a clang from the back of the stall.

"Charmy! I told you to clean the pots, not leave them on the ground!"

"Ops, sorry vector. *Hehe* I guess i should be more careful."

"You better be, you almost ruined my sandwich too."

"Some things never change." Mighty shrugged at their antics, turning his attention back to the two.

"Now, what can I get the special couple?"

Shadow almost rolled his eyes at that, but Pinkie saw something on the board above that made her gasp with excitement.

"THEY HAVE COTTON CANDY HERE?"

Shadow couldn't help but let out a quiet chuckle at her excitement. "It looks like she's found something."

Mighty politely smiled, nodding. He went to ready an order in the tablet in front of him.

"We'll have one large chocolate milkshake, all the stops, and two pink cotton candy sticks." Shadow relayed.

"If you please?" Pinkie added.

"Of course. We'll have to you shortly."

Shadow turned, and gestured his hand to the tables. "You pick one."

Pinkie went to sit at one the tables, and Shadow joined her. Their order got to them soon enough, delivered by Espio. Both of them thanked him in their own ways, and he went back to the small kitchen.

For a minute, Pinkie was starting at her cotton candy, and Shadow noticed.

"What is it?"

Pinkie blinked. "Oh, I, was just, waiting for you."

Shadow smiled. "Go ahead. Just don't try to make a mess, okay?"

She took a big bite of the floss, and her eyes lit up.
"This is soo sweet!"

Shadow chuckled plucking a piece off of his candy and popping it into his mouth.
"I'm glad you enjoy it."

Next Pinkie tried a sip of the milkshake. "Mmm! How do they make it so tasty?"

"I don't know. I guess they just have a knack for milkshakes."

The two casually talked while eating/drinking, making little jokes, and having light to more blatant flirtations towards each other. They finished their milkshake first. And as they talked, the more their love started to show.

Shadow had a hand out on the table, the other hand resting his right cheek. Pinkie was doing the same thing, and placed her hoof on his hand. They were being watched however, from the snack bar.

Mighty had crossed his arms on the counter, watching the happy couple.

"Hey, what show are we missing?" Vector, Espio and Charmy come out to the counter to see what Mighty was staring at.

"Just look at those two." Mighty said, keeping his eyes on the romantic interaction.

"Is that who Rouge mentioned?" Vector inquired.

"Yep." Mighty nodded.

"Well they certainly look close." Charmy noted.

Vector scoffed. "Close, Charmy, do you see this?"

Espio started to speak. "The long soft grins, the love gazing stares-"

Vector interrupted, low-handedly pointing to Shadow.

"Look, Shadow's smiling publicly!"

Espio finished his point. "Whomever she is, she must be something special to do that to him."

"Indeed." Charmy agreed with the group and for a moment everyone was quiet. Suddenly Vector shouted towards the hedgehog and mare.

"Hey, you two should kiss!"

The shout snapped the two out of it, and they noticed the small audience they gathered behind the counter.

Shadow immediately blushed, his ears drooping down slightly in embarrassment. He looked away from them. Pinkie simply closed her eyes and giggled.

Suddenly, she had an idea. She gestured for his ear, and whispered something. Shadow suddenly chuckled, gaining a mischievous look on his face.
Shadow wrote something down on a napkin, and moved it to the corner of the table, plus 10 dollars.

"Way to spoil the mood Vector." Espio sighed with disappointment.

"What?" Vector sounded surprised. "It was a joke!"

Shadow and Pinkie both stole a quick look at Vector, then they focused their eyes on each other.

"Uh, guys?" Mighty suddenly realized that the couple seemingly didn't take it as a joke.

As soon as Vector's eyes shifted back over, it was to his, and the teams', surprise to see the two sharing a prolonged kiss.

The group started to freak out at the scene as Pinkie and Shadow departed. Pinkie was giggling up a storm, and Shadow was trying his hardest to hide a grin forming on his face. The two stood, and started walking away from the scene they created. Mighty noticed the tip on the table, and walked out from behind the stall. He picked up the tip, and saw the napkin note.

hope that was enough of a tip for you

Mighty chuckled, and walked back over to the counter. The Chaotix looked at the napkin as Mighty let it and the money flop onto the counter.

"There's the tip."



Their night came to an end as Shadow and Pinkie Pie were walking to Sugarcube Corner, Shadow having his arm around between her neck and back.

"That was pretty fun." Shadow stated, gazing up to the sky. Pinkie agreed, as they reached the building.

"It was."

The two shared a quiet moment, staring at the door.

"Hey," Shadow was speaking quietly to her. "We should remember to have these moments together."

Pinkie nuzzled his side. "We always are."