Chapter 4; Bargains and Plans

Shadow watched from behind the mirror as the creature slept in the bed, listening as Dr. Morres filled him in on what their inspection of their 'guest' had turned up. To be honest, the black hedgehog hadn't expected the creature to settle in like he'd been told it had. But what mattered to him most was finding out who was behind those emerald eyes, so he stayed silent. "We ran the tissue sample we collected, and it's as the files you gathered said. That lab was experimenting with sapients, and splicing their DNA with fragments of feral DNA to create what we have in this room. The goal was to create intelligent bioweapons, then sell them to the highest bidders. This one was a hedgehog sapient, spliced with feral wolf DNA." Shadow wrinkled his nose in disgust at the thought, these were living beings those fool scientists had been destroying- quite literally. So far every subject they'd spliced had died, and likely this one would have too if they'd had a chance to continue. And all for what; an unlikely chance of creating a tormented flesh and blood creature that would eventually get shot and killed? It had been different for Shadow, since he was immortal; if Commander Graves had succeeded in making Shadow his bioweapon, he'd not have been taken down easily on the battlefield. But a normal Sapient was another matter, and the thought sickened him. "Do we know who 'this' is?" He asked back pointedly, not liking having no name to call the rescued hedgehog.

Dr. Morres sighed, the young red-headed woman straightening her glasses at the other's impatience. "We're in luck. G.U.N. doesn't have very many sapients on file, but we have a match for him, from a previous arrest." Shadow cast her glare of annoyance, and she stopped hesitating. "It's Sonic the Hedgehog. I really don't know how they got their hands on him, but…" Morres trailed off as the hedgehog agent next to her bristled angrily, though he felt as much sorrow as rage that those humans had done this. Sonic was annoying, cocky and headstrong, but he didn't deserve something so horrible like what had been done to him the last months. "Is he…healthy?" He managed to say, clenching his fists; the other sapients had died. Would Sonic…? Fortunately the woman didn't leave him wondering for long. "From what we can tell, he's stable. He's undernourished and has some contusions on his left side, but otherwise our biggest concerns are now over his cognitive abilities." Shadow knew what that meant, and there had been no way to tell with him being sedated. So far all he'd shown was that he recognized the uses of some of the room's objects. And now that he looked to be awake again, and had finished his nap, they could finally see if Sonic's mind was still functioning.

The shallow, lidded puzzle box was tricky, but not terribly hard. Opening it required arranging numbered tiles into the right slots, counting down from six. That released the handle, which he had to twist in a circle once before it allowed him to slide the lid off sideways. It was supposed to test his intelligence, Sonic guessed, and it did little to make him believe he wasn't still an experiment at the laboratory. He was still even being served food in pet bowls; which he refused to eat and drink from like some feral, choosing to cup the bowls between his paws to either drink or tilt the dry chunks of food into his mouth. It turned out to be some sort of kibble, but he was hungry enough that any meal was a meal worth eating. Then once he was finished emptying the bowls the show truly began. Throwing the dishes at the mirror was a nice start, followed by the satisfactory sound of the box and its lid thunking off the surprisingly impact-resistant surface. And just in case he hadn't gotten his point across with that, he followed up by charging the reflective surface, curling his fingers to smack the back of one hand-like paw against it to show his middle finger was raised to those on the other side. Then the icing on the cake was to spin around and kick out at the mirror with his hind paws before retreating back to a corner to bristle, stare at the door, and wait for the punishment that was sure to come. It had been so long since he'd been able to act out against his captors that he had gone a little overboard in trying to tick them off; just to show he wouldn't let them brainwash him. Removing the collar had given his confidence a boost, but after this tantrum, they'd really put the hurt on him.

Smirking, the black hedgehog turned to face Dr. Morres. Sonic had not only aced the box, but shown that his attitude wasn't lacking; after all he'd been through Sonic had every right to be angry. "I'd say he passed. Now may I finally see him?" He'd needed the clearance from the woman first, since she'd been the only G.U.N. scientist suitable to put in charge of Sonic. So in this case she outranked him. Morres looked a little shocked by what had happened, and he assumed she hadn't expected Sonic's mind to still be in one piece. "I…yes, but first we must be sure that he won't continue to show aggressive behaviour and-" Shadow cut her off, his voice strained with frustration at her continued stalling. "Sonic has been tormented by the worst of the worst, so there IS no way to know if he'll be aggressive to us unless we confront him. And I am the best choice, because of my enhanced healing abilities." He seriously doubted that the other would attack him, but even if he did, Shadow healed at an impressive rate. Morres paused reluctantly, but sighed heavily and gave her permission, and Shadow waited not a second longer.

Shadow carefully opened the door to hear Sonic huff aggressively at him from under the bed, which the other he must have squeezed under after he'd left observation room. But the huffing stopped, and a confused face peered out from under the bed as soon as he realized who the visitor was. To be honest, Sonic wasn't sure if he could trust Shadow, not when he didn't know where he was, or even who'd captured him in the first place. It wasn't as if those scientist goons had answered any of his questions while he could still ask them. So he eyed the other suspiciously when he sank to his knees not far from the door he'd closed behind him. "Sonic. I know it's you." What to say? He wasn't the best at comforting people. "Rouge and I rescued you from a private research facility called The Research and Development Chimera Laboratories, and brought you here to safety. We wanted to make sure your mind was still intact. Do you remember me?" He held out a hand, palm up, in an open gesture to show he meant no harm. Sonic was still reluctant, but then again, hadn't this explanation matched with when he'd shown up at the lab and removed his muzzle? He was unhindered, Shadow was unarmed, and he wasn't angry, or at least didn't look angry. If anything, the black hedgehog looked…almost sympathetic.

Okay it was weird enough to get any sympathetic look from the tough guy, and he pulled himself out from under the bed to answer him as best he could. "Hhhhrgrow." The other was taken aback by the odd growl, and Sonic dropped his blue ears in response to the attempt at saying Shadow's name, looking away miserably. That hadn't been what he'd meant to say, that hadn't been what he'd wanted to say not even close. There was a lot more that he craved to say as well, that he knew would go unheard. But if he was worried about the response to the guttural growl, Shadow wasn't offended. "You can't speak, can you?" The spiky blue head shook no. "This mutation, is there any way to reverse it?" Another head-shake no, and the blue head drooped to match the sagging ears. That was one of the few things the scientists had kept telling him, that there was no hope of returning to his life after the changes to his body had started becoming visible. There was no way to cure him or turn him back to normal again. No way for him to return to his old life. Ever.

This was too much to bear, how could Sonic look so dejected that he looked like he was trying to melt into the floor? It touched even Shadow, as he moved forwards to touch the matted fur, absently stroking it to provide some sort of comfort. Sonic had lost a great deal of himself in RDCL's captivity, if he'd given up on the odds after all that had happened in his life. "Listen to me. You've never given up so don't you dare do that now." As sharp as those words were, they had a softer edge that made sonic look up in surprise. "I promise you, if there's any way to give you back what those butchers stole, I won't stop until I find it. And I have no doubt Dr. Morres and her team will help." He gave the mirror an expectant look, knowing that G.U.N.'s research teams were always disturbingly ready for some new genetics project to get busy with, but thankfully none of it involving making another ultimate lifeform.

Then suddenly he was trying not to fall backwards as his lap was very, very full of fur and spines that were thankfully relaxed enough to not scratch him. Instinctively he tried to push Sonic away, but it seemed the other was oblivious to his usual obsession with personal space. Not that he'd push the head and front paws of the shaking animal away. Shaking. And making whuffling sounds. Damn it. Now he couldn't push the crying creature away without dealing with more guilt than he was willing to deal with at the moment, and he focused on trying to soothe him; something he was extremely unfamiliar with. However petting seemed to work, and scratching behind the blue ears seemed to almost have a soporific effect, making it possible to slide him off his own legs to the floor beside him. Shadow continued to stroke the tangled fur, surprisingly soft despite its neglect, and wondering what it would feel like to his bare fingers before he stopped himself. This was not a pet or a lab experiment, this was a person. And he sure as heck wasn't going to fondle his coat like he wasn't sentient.

Another problem was what to do with him. He couldn't leave Sonic here, Chaos, he himself could barely stand being here after his years as either an experiment in longevity or as a potential bioweapon. The mess beside him had literally just been pulled from what Shadow considered a torture facility. There was no way he'd recover from his trauma here in yet another lab, and the Commander wanted to keep this quiet, which meant Sonic couldn't stay in the barracks or a spare dorm. There was no way that Sonic could stay on this base without either living in an observation room like this and not in a nicer place without word getting out that the creature he'd brought back was the famed Sonic the Hedgehog. Or would it? Shadow lived on his own when he wasn't staying at the G.U.N. dorms, on a property that had belonged to Gerald before the man had moved to the ARK to conduct his research. It was private and in a quiet community, with enough trees in the yard to divert prying eyes when Shadow wanted to lounge in the yard. The black hedgehog had a decent plan coming together, and now he just had to pitch it to the person who counted most. "Sonic, I need to check a few things." He told the unhappy mess of fur and spines on the floor. "I'll be back soon, you'll be fine here." The response to that was amusing enough, the former hedgehog worriedly looking at the mirror before sitting up on his hind legs and crossing his front legs in an unhappy pout. "I said I'll be back." Shadow said sternly, ignoring the other's returned worried expression as he turned and left.

/No no no don't go!/ Sonic thought to himself; he really didn't want to be left alone right now, especially in a place as creepy as the white room. He stared at the door and whined miserably for a few minutes, backing up alarmed when it opened and Dr. Morres came in. /Great, another white coat-wearing person? I'm sick of these so-called doctors./ Trust didn't come as easily when you'd become as helpless as he felt right now. Really, he didn't want to be here at all. He would give anything to return to the workshop where he stayed with Tails. If his brother would even recognize him right now… Great, and now she was introducing herself and talking, and asking him to do stupid things to further convince her of his ability to think. Follow the pen with his eyes, answer questions with one stomp or two, and then she asked him to write. /Why me?/ With his paws, hands, whatever…with them the way they were, he was afraid, afraid that he'd fail. Afraid he couldn't manage such a simple but commonplace thing; yet one more ability he'd taken for granted. But at the same time, he had to know.

With a gulp, he reached out and gripped the pen with a paw, bending his fingers to hold it against his palm. So far so good, but his thumb was no longer of any use. "Take your time, Sonic." She sounded kind, but there was just something about her that made her feel untrustworthy. After another moment and some fumbling he got it between his fingers in a way that satisfied his need to control the pen's movements, and wrote on the paper she'd offered from her clipboard. /Okay, it's messy, but..I think I can actually do this./ The words scrawled across the paper were sloppy and large, but for the first time he had some hope return as to just how trapped inside this unwanted body he was. "Can I get a TV?" was what the words he'd written read, and really, if he was going to be stuck here waiting for who knew how long, he didn't want to be bored to death with nothing to do like he had earlier. Dr. Morres seemed taken aback by the simple request, but he felt it summed up just how himself he was despite how feral he looked.

Ugh. The meeting had taken hours, and needed the stubborn, doubtful Dr. Morres to give her 'professional' opinion. Her report to Commander Tower was lengthy, crammed full of ifs and buts, and he wanted to curse when it was over. She even went so far as to mention his vicious reputation back at R.D.C.L.(shown in the stolen files), and brought up the tantrum against the room's mirror, despite how "placid he's been since Agent Shadow visited him". Placid indeed; Shadow offered in Sonic's defence that the blue former-hedgehog's history with the private lab involved a forced hostile environment coupled with the fact Sonic had no idea where he was when he awoke. The arguments went back and forth for some time before a compromise was made between him and Morres that the Commander could agree with. Shadow could bring Sonic into his home for monitoring, as long as he reported in on the "hedgewolf"(a name the black hedgehog considered more dignified than "creature") once a week, and brought him in once a month minimum for a thorough health checkup and observation. Commander Tower approved of the agent's idea to claim the hedgewolf was one of Gerald's previous creations, recently woken from suspended animation. However, Tower said also this would mean that Sonic would have to act like a domesticated pet in public. The key was getting blue to agree to this.