Tails - Mad Scientist

Getting a Taste

Dreams of places from his past floated by, one after the other. Some quickly, some it seemed for a while. It was as if his life was flashing before his eyes.

Nauseated, spinning through his life. Sucked into nightmare after nightmare.

He came to his senses. He was awake again.

He only was able to process everything that had gone through his head now that was back from his slumber. It wasn't fun. His worst experiences...

Where was he?

Unconsciously trying to bring his hand to his head, he found his movement restricted. He was in a chair, with his hands and legs restrained to it.

Turning his head, he realized he was restricted up there, too. Some kind of bowl-shaped thing was keeping him from being able to move freely.

Shadow could only see what was in front of him. It was some kind of lab. He could see a litany of panels, screens, and equipment. Shadow tried to look from side to side, but he couldn't move much. It sounded like someone was over on the right side of the room.

There was a dull pain in his head. He tried wriggling slightly. The dull pain became sharp. He grunted. Then he wriggled again.

"Whoa, whoa, sit still over there!"

Tails quickly ran over to him, but slowed as Shadow stopped moving.

Shadow began to breathe faster. The dull pain in his head, the nauseated feeling he had, they were connected. Something was literally connected to his head.

"If you break that device, you might lose brain functionality. And there's some stuff in your head that I need."

The restrictiveness and invasiveness were bringing back terrible memories. He shuddered, and tried to calm himself. What was going on?

Tails examined Shadow closely. "Everything's connected all good? Nothing's paralyzed, right?"

Not a very reassuring set of questions. Shadow wriggled again, running his legs and hands into their restraints.

"Good, good," Tails said, turning away. The lab coat he was wearing whisked on the ground.

Tails ruffled the strands of hair on his head a few times as he walked over to the panel. Placing his hands on the panel, he arched his back and took some deep breaths. Shadow thought he was looking at something on the panel, but then he touched his forehead to the dashboard and held it there a few seconds. His eyes appeared to be closed.

Suddenly, he bolted upright, and spun on his heel towards Shadow, business-like.

"You know where Sonic and Amy are. If you won't tell me, that's fine. There are other ways of figuring out what you know."

Shadow kept his eyes on him. Tails turned back to the panel.

"I've got you hooked up to a neat little brain-scanning device. Perhaps if you're having trouble remembering where Sonic and Amy are, we can take a look through your memories...how does that sound?"

Shadow's eyes had widened, though he shut them and reset before Tails could see his reaction. Tails' calculating look did not find anything on Shadow's face to grasp.

"Of course, at any time, you can simply tell me where Sonic and Amy are, and we can stop this."

He waited for Shadow's response. Shadow considered his options. This setup was frightening. But he was strong. He couldn't jeopardize Rouge just yet. Tails thought he was a traitor, and he very well might try to interfere with the plan if Shadow told him about it. He didn't know how much time had passed. Was Rouge on the ship?