"I just don't see why you would do this, Freddy."
Freddy was seated in an interview room, facing Mr Rogers, playing with his fingers under the table and once again in the grips of hypnosis, with no control.
What a time to lose control. Just like in the jewellery shop.
His mind was still there, buried under piles and piles of hypnosis fog, making his body act without it being his will. The fingers- picking at hangnails- were his, though; working by his will rather than by the strange one he was in the grips of. He was slowly but surely breaking through the hypnosis, gaining strength, chipping away at the concrete walls and taking more and more of his body for himself.
"Why did you do it?"
Freddy said nothing.
"You have your friends, your house; you're part of Mystery Inc., for goodness' sake! Why did you need to do this?"
Still Freddy said nothing. His mouth refused to work. Mr Rogers sat back and sighed.
"The last time I saw you, you weren't like this. Something's wrong."
Freddy looked up, glorying in suddenly regaining control of his eyes.
"Something isn't the same about you. Maybe it's just that you're sitting in front of me charged with burglary and enough evidence on the table in front of you for you to be found guilty almost immediately. But I have a feeling there's something else as well, something that goes deeper."
The man leaned forwards, looking straight into Freddy's eyes with his hazel ones, practically replicas of Shaggy's. Freddy had to look away.
"Why, Freddy? Just tell me why. Maybe I'll be able to understand."
For one glorious moment, the fog was suddenly beaten, and Freddy felt the control flow through him; his body was his once again.
"I wasn't in control. I didn't do anything."
And then it was back, smothering his free will, like a curtain over a sunny window. He bowed his head at a hissed command and his eyes found his hands, still under his control mercifully.
"I don't quite know what to make of that," Mr Jones said after a brief silence, and Freddy kept his head down, silently hating the man controlling him and using every inch of his energy to chip away at the control, at the concrete walls surrounding him, chipping more with every second that passed. Soon he would be out, out of the man's grasp, able to tell the world what had happened and able to overthrow the charges against him. If he was to keep his innocence, he would have to work as hard as he could. All his mental energy would be used up, but boy would it be worth it.
"Interview ended at eleven thirty-three, the twenty-second of February."
Mr Rogers reached over and turned the tape recorder off, his brow still furrowed at Freddy's brief speech, trying to work out the eight words that Freddy had managed to get out while his body was his once again- not that Mr Rogers knew of the internal struggle.
"OK, Freddy. Stand up. I'll take you back to your cell, and in a while your friends are going to get here, so maybe you should sharpen your story for them."
Freddy stood, still thinking hard, and allowed Mr Rogers to take him away. Or rather, the man in control allowed him to.