Miles' Zero Quest

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Chapter 1: Storm/Birth

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What is the definite boundary between sleep and wakefulness, oblivion and consciousness?

He opened his eyes and gazed vacantly at the unfamiliar surroundings. At first, he coined it up to the aforementioned boundary. Memory is sometimes hazy when you recover from deep sleep.

He was lying on something soft. A bed? He identified the material as being made of pure cotton.

He could hear nothing at all but the sound of his own heart. It was steadily increasing. He measured his pulse. Nominal.

He could smell... many things, albeit nothing intimately familiar. He could still somehow tell them apart. His own scent, very faint. The sheets he was lying on, freshly washed. The smell of wood. The smell of mechanic oil. The smell of circuits.

He could taste his own saliva, and even that felt unfamiliar. A bit tangy. A bit too much acid. Must have slept for long.

He could see, unblinking, through a window. Wooden frame, probably ironwood, his mind supplied. Double panes. Beyond the glass there was only the sky, saturated with heavy black clouds.

As he watched, he heard the wind blowing for the first time. The clouds danced violently at its wake. Then his world became light. Before he could regain his vision, a booming sound shattered the already breached silence.

He yelped, the first sound from his mouth. His mind told him it was just lightning. Electrical discharge from cloud to cloud. So hot it displaces air and creates sound. No danger.

His body told him to hide and he did so, diving underneath his oversized pillow and curling into a tight, shivering ball of orange fluff, tails wrapped around his body. He didn't even notice he sported two of the appendages.

Dominated by irrational fear, it was only a full hour later he managed to calm himself down, meekly, hesitantly emerging from underneath his feeble shelter. It was just raining now. The thunderstorm had subsided.

He once again regarded his immediate space, uttering his first words in a tiny, young voice. "Who am I?"

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After minutes of exploration, he located a mirror. Placed in a small bathroom, it was full-sized and yet very plain.

He only hesitated for a moment, then walked before the reflective surface. He gazed at himself in wonder, taking in his appearance. The first word that jumped to his mind was 'puny'.

"I am a fox, a mobian, sentient, sapient fox of male gender," he declared to no one in particular. Like with everything else, he had no idea where such knowledge originated from. His mind had simply provided it as a universal truth and he had no reason to doubt it. He looked behind him, at his two particularly fluffy tails that were reflexively moving and waving on their own.

"A thick coat of three main colors," he went on, as if reciting a report. "White on my face, chest, belly and tailtips; black on my hands and feet; Orange on everywhere else. I also have an extra tail. Possible mutation or a family trait. None of my tails seems dominant; my spine is split evenly down in the middle after my pelvis. Age..."

He paused at that, his brows furrowing. This was the first time two separate parts of his mysterious knowledge clashed. His body was a body of three to four years. His mind, though, seemed to be a lot older. Such an inconsistency vexed him. It simply defied logic.

He let a sigh. "Age appears to be three, at most four years. Further research will be required. Name... unknown."

He gulped at that, looking away from the mirror. Lacking a name left him with an overpowering sense of emptiness. Making that his new objective, he left the bathroom, deciding to explore the rest of the house. He soon discovered what he believed was a kitchen. The young fox kept expecting to run to another sentient being, both hoping and dreading such an encounter. Perhaps they would be able to explain to him who he really was. On the other hand, meeting anyone in his condition, probably amnesia, he theorized, would put him at a distinct disadvantage.

The first thing he noticed in the new room was the fridge. Device meant to preserve edible substances, provided his mind. He was ravenously hungry, provided his stomach. The fridge proved to be stocked to the brim. Also, most of its contents needed little to no preparation. He sniffed the cold air once, then retrieved what he knew were a couple of chicken sandwiches.

He struggled for a few seconds, then managed to climb on the overly tall, for him, chair, barely able to reach the room's table. The sandwiches were swiftly devoured. It was only after his hunger was sated that he noticed another item on the table. A thick notebook.

With trembling hands, he opened it at the first page, almost jumping from his seat as a pencil fell from inside. The notebook was empty, except for a single, handwritten phrase at the top of the first page.

'Property of Miles Prower.'

The tiny fox blinked at that, astonished by the fact he could read fluently. Another clue belying what his age seemed to be. "Miles Prower," he repeated aloud, as if tasting the name. There was no familiarity to it and he frowned a bit. "It sounds like a pun if you say it fast. Could it be...?"

Gazing at the pencil, he gulped again, slowly picking it up. It felt very natural in his hand, a true extension of his will.

"Miles Prower," he repeated again as he expertly wrote that name below the first one. He let the writing implement down and compared the two lines. They were nearly identical.

"Uncannily coping someone else's handwriting is improbable," he declared. "Unless I find another clue, my name is Miles Prower. Miles Prower, the two-tailed fox.

For the first time he could remember, Miles smiled. "Now to other important matters," he decided nodding to himself. "Like naming my two tails," he added very seriously, hugging said appendages with affection.

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The newly named Vortex and Hurricane, his left and right tail respectively, waved behind him happily as Miles explored the rest of his apparent home. Following a small corridor that connected his bedroom, bathroom and kitchen, he reached what he believed was a plain living room, the yet largest space he had ever seen, albeit still small. There were two more doors there. One of them obviously led outside and he didn't even approach it. The other one, though, seemed to call to him. Excited about a possible clue regarding his lost memories, he hastily opened that door, his jaw hitting the floor at the spectacle.

The new room, easily larger than the rest of the house put together, was a combination of laboratory, machine shop and library. Haphazardly filled bookcases hid half of the walls, numerous messy workbenches with unidentifiable gadgets, machine parts and tools were all around and he could even see the shell of a half-completed vehicle of unknown function and identity.

"This... this is heaven!" he exclaimed on impulse, although he wasn't sure why. The place, his workshop, he decided, mightily appealed to his instincts despite the apparent sloppiness of its previous users.

Hardly thinking about it, he reached one of the desks, grabbed a piece of paper and a nearby pen and started drawing the blueprints of complex machinery.

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Miles stirred groggily. Once again he blinked in puzzlement at his surroundings. This time, though, the memory of the previous day came to him clearly. "I fell asleep," he realized aloud, after remove the thumb he had apparently been sucking. Talking to himself was starting to become a habit. With no one else around, he felt the need to occasionally break the prevailing silence.

Hurricane twitched in discomfort from under his cheek and he raised his head from his impromptu pillow. His other tail reached his face and gently wiped his weary eyes as he stretched and yawned. He had been consumed by his work for hours, never noticing night had come, and only falling asleep a mere hour before dawn, his child body finally giving out.

"Well, then Miles," he addressed himself. "Another day for you to conquer. Another day of figuring out my existence," he went on, glancing at his plans and freaking out a bit when he noticed the slobber stains he had left.

"Today I shall venture outside this building." In truth, he was trying to encourage himself. Intellectually, he was aware the world was a lot larger than the walls around him, but the thought of going out was downright scary. He left his seat, wincing a bit at the soreness he felt. Sleeping on a desk hadn't been such a good idea, after all.

"I shall venture outside," he repeated, self-importantly. Then his eyes went wide, his legs crossed a bit and he looked downwards. "After a bathroom break," he finished with a yelp, running and barely reaching in time for Nature's call.

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There had been many articles of clothing in his room, all stashed inside a wardrobe and all at his correct size. Despite that, he only felt the need to wear a pair of gloves, a pair of socks and a pair of red and white sneakers. Unlike children his age, he was aware of modesty and embarrassment, but he had verified his fur was long enough to more than conceal what little there was to be hidden. The weather was pretty hot after last day's storm and he felt that anything more would prove constricting.

He confidently walked to the front door, then stood very still, his hand on the handle, not unlike a statue. His tails were rigid behind him and also very still for the first time, reflecting the dread he felt.

"This is very easy," he said out loud, despite lacking an audience. "In fact, this is laughable," he added. "Nothing easier than turning the handle, tugging at it and stepping outside. Child's play." A bead of nervous sweat rolled off his face, dropping at the floor. He heard it as clear as a drum.

Miles gulped, took three deep breaths and tried again. Instead, his hand left the handle, falling lifelessly to his side. Ignoring the room's comfy couch, he sat on the floor, back against the offending door, and he hugged his legs with arms and tails, feeling both fear and shame.

"It's only natural. Stupid but natural. I can recall nothing but what is inside these walls. Of course I'm afraid of the unknown."

He sat there idle, trying to suppress the shivers running down his spine, all the way to the tips of his twin appendages. His mind proved unhelpful as he started visualizing any possible horror that could be lurking outside. Dinosaurs perhaps. Of the carnivorous kind. Or dragons. Or lions. Or aliens. Or firearm-wielding thugs. Or mobian-eating plants. Or mutant abominations of unstable DNA configuration, towering at the height of mountains with lots of poisonous tentacles. Or, worse, lightning!

Vortex reached for his face and wiped away tears he hadn't noticed he was shedding. He gritted his teeth and decided he had to face the outdoors, even if it meant his demise. The food he had available wouldn't last forever and being devoured was preferable to dying of hunger.

Gathering his resolve, he returned to his feet, took and held a deep breath and reached for the handle once more. His fur stood on edge in a futile attempt to make him seem large and intimidating. He turned the handle, kicked the door open and all but leaped outside, ready to make the inevitable, to his mind, fight or flight decision.

He was standing on a raised wooden platform, a small patio between his door and the ground. His house was in the middle of a tranquil beach, with soft, golden sand that was still a bit damp from the rain. Palm trees dotted the place, with seagulls and other, harmless birds flying around. The clean blue sea beyond the sand was calm, only slightly waving back and forth hypnotically. The slight smell of salt caressed his nose.

After standing very still for almost a minute, Miles fell on his knees, his relief so great his legs failed to support him. The tiny vulpine snickered to himself, with only a slight trace of madness.

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End of chapter 1.

A/N: There you have it, my first multi-chaptered story in this category. This is basically a loose adaptation of 'Tails Adventure', a Game Gear game of the 'ancient' year of 1995. The English manual fudged the story, but it's basically Tails' first adventure, happening surprisingly before he met Sonic. It was republished as a mini-game in many Sonic collections, including 'Sonic Adventure DX'.

The game itself has no dialogue, so expect me to heavily modify it and add some secondary characters. Those who know of the game, should rightly expect dark themes from this story. While I will do my best to maintain a healthy amount of humor, this could possibly become dark enough to qualify for an M rating. It goes without saying there will be action. Tails must discover his often ignored chaos powers, after all.

The updates will be chaotic, of course. Don't expect any kind of schedule, although reviews do occasionally help to speed me up.