Autor's note: Temporal Epilepsy is a real desease. I know someone close to me that was diagnosed with this. The brain tricks you to have almost metaphysical experiences like deja vús and a sense of purpose… Although they have not discovered all the possible causes for this to happen, its treatable…
Anyway, have a nice reading and review ;)
Chapter X: Recursive Memories
"How was ARK in the old days?" the pink female asks to Shadow, while they left the train.
The doors shut tight behind then and the flickers of the yellow light from inside of the carriage starts to fade as fast as the train gains speed and leaves the station.
Shadow and Amy talked about the past, about the good and bad times...
The ebony male was at first relutant, but, when the pink female exposed her past too, even before she met Sonic and was honest about it, somehow made him more confortable to share is own memories with her.
"It was peacefull… Unbelievably quiet. The only thing you could hear was the constant humming from the machines working… but eventually it becomes background noise." -Shadow chuckled and looked upon the the moon fused with ARK - "Its funny thou… The scientists had sound records from the nature of this planet… I remember to watch Dr. Gerald falling asleep at his desk, while the sound of rain was being reproduced..."
The pink female looks down, her quills fell a bit towards her face, hiding her muzzle.
"Maybe it was a way for them to remember what it felt like to live down here… Honestly, from the last time I was up there… I felt such solitude, such reclusion. I could look down and see home, yet, it felt somehow confined, almost like a prison." Amy looked up as well, a chilly wisp of wind made her shiver and the pink female hugged herself to keep warm.
Shadow looked at her and remembered Maria saying in a metaforic way, she felt like a bird inside a cage. It felt strange.
Maria always sensed that ARK was her salvation and her prison. With her weak immune system, she couldn't dare to be on the planet, because a simple cold could kill her.
Her desease, NIDS, were only more or less controlled, because of the efforts of Dr. Gerald and her reclusion on ARK.
The space colony had a sterile environment, and the higiene protocols were so strick, it was hard for bacteries and other patogenic agents develop enough to become a threat.
"Are you okay Shadow?" Amy looked to him after some seconds of silence. It was like he was lost in thoughts.
"Nevermind… Its getting late. Lets get you home asap." he says in a monotone voice, with his eyesight lost somewhere in the horizon of the city in front of them.
Amy was walking by his side, when suddently he picks her bridal style.
She was caught by suprise and almost fell from his arms, but he easly controled her twitches as he pulls her closer to him. Amy had her forearms against his chest, feeling something between helpless and protected.
Unconsciously, it was like she was creating a barrier between her personal space and him, only to the limit to be broken, when he gently places her left arm around his shoulders, pulling her close and wispers in a taciturn manner:
"Hold yourself tight or else you will fall."
His voice, made some strands of Amy's quills to move gently, touching her neck, making the female shiver. She was so embarrased for being so close to him that her body temperature rose a bit, making her cheeks turn red.
However, he wasn't indifferent to the proximity between them too.
His enanced senses were making him feel uncomfortable while being inebriated by the scent of her skin.
She had a sweet and floral smell mixed with some pheromones Amy was emitting from being nervous.
His sense of smell was so strong, that from meters away he could even know, when Rouge had her period… Wich annoyed and grossed him out, making him even more anti-social than he usually is at those awkward moments.
However Amy scent wasn't making him more misantropic, but the exact reverse.
He found himself thinking about what her skin tasted like and when he realized his devious thoughts, he bluntly lets her fall into the ground.
"Lets exercise the legs. You need to burn some calories from the dinner."
Amy got up pissed off and offended, with a sore posterior.
"What's wrong with you?! In a second you grab me without my consent and in the next you let me fall like this! Is this a prank?!"
"I'm not like Faker, Rose. If you want me to escort safely to your place, you have to use your feet."
Shadow hissed bluntly, with his crossed arms, trying to control more devious thoughts by being unfriendly.
Amy grunts annoyed and confused by the sudden change of personality. While in the train, Shadow was pacient, assertive, calm and kinda… kind.
Now, he turned into a cold hearted bi-polar bastard.
"Enough! I can walk alone. Bye!"
As she turns her back to him, hissing under her breath, kinda disapointed with his behaviour. Shadow suddently panicked, all he wanted was to somehow challenge her, to keep the distance between then, but he somehow felt that he needed to make amends.
It was strange, when she turned her back to him, he felt a uncomfortable cold on his heart and he reached her hand with his own.
When the pink female feels his hand touching hers, the time froze. It triggered a memory, she was walking in a corridor illuminated by the planet bellow, when Shadow pulls her hand.
She felt like a small electric shock making her blink few times and triggers another memory inside that memory.
Suddently she was at the top of a cliff close to the sea, almost falling, when a long haired warrior grabs her porcelain hand and she yells to him in a strange language.
Amy was having sudden, huges migraines and her hands were shaking without her be able to control. Shadow aproached and grabbed her on the shoulders but her eyes weren't even looking while she talked in some strange language and her body was shaking like bamboo in a windy day.
"Amy? AMY!" Shadow tries to wake her up from her transe like state, but Amy was trapped inside some sort of deja-vú loop. One deja-vú triggered another deja-vú and it was recursive.
It was like she was stucked in a loop of memories triggered by his hand reaching and touching hers in a specific way.
The experience was being so intense, that she starts to cry, to sweat, to gasp for air leaving Shadow with only one option. To knock her out.
With a swift move and controlled strength, Shadow with only two fingers taps the side of her neck, hitting the external carotid artery. The oxigen flow to the brain was stopped by a short period of time, making her faint.
But when pink female passes out, this time, Shadow holds her gently on his arms worried.
"This isn't normal…" the ebony male was once again picking her up, bridal style, remembering when Maria had major health crisis because of NIDS. With her physical suffering, Shadow suffered too, all he could do was grab her hand.
The ebony hedgehog noticed the urge to protect Amy while looking to her now, peacefull face.
It was a fuzzy and warm feeling that somewhat he repressed after the few encounters he had with the rose hedgehog. And it was quite a mistery to him why he only felt like that everytime he was near her.
But now wasn't the time to reflect about the matters of the heart. He felt a small drop of cold water slidding down his face and the clouds shrouded the moon.
Before another tear from the sky could hit him or her, they desapeared into a ball of chaos light.
The scenario changed from a quiet train station into a rushed and busy hospital. Shadow chaos controled to the front of a emergency service, leaving some of the people staring at them, including some of the doctors, that only stop when they recognised who he was.
Usually Shadow's looks and body language instinctively demanded respect from others, but now with a formal and condecorated militar outfit made some people to stay away from his path as he goes through and pushes with his right shoulder, the glass door.
He could care less if there was an arrival order as he walks foward to the reception desk, ignoring almost 30 creatures on the line.
"Mister, I have to ask you to respect others and..."
"What do they have? A fucking cold? For all you know, this girl can be dying right now, and all you care is about the rules?!"
The brown female rabbit just sighs and tries to ignore the complaints of the people behind the ebony male as she asks about the symptoms. Shadow's tone was more assertive as he explains with detail all that happened, leaving the receptionist chocked to know he knock Amy out.
A red paper bracelet was placed on Amy's right wrist as they placed in the hammock and took her away from him to make some exams.
Shadow sat in a corner of the busy emergency wating room. He looked around and as time passed by, he saw people hugging their beloved ones as soon they left corridor… Others to fall on their knees as the doctor talked while looking to the ground… And in the midle of everything, there was children, playing around the chairs, completly oblivious about the life and death surrounding them.
And like the children, Shadow was lost in thoughts, as the hours goes by, he was worried and… nostalgic.
While remembering about the conversations he had with Amy, Shadow remembered about fond memories from ARK, when a male squirel with a medical gown blocks the lamp light.
"Mr. Shadow? Can I talk to you?"
Shadow shakes himself up, almost waking up from a day dreaming state and rises from the seat.
"I'm listening."
"Hi, I'm Charles, a neurologist who did some medical exams to Miss Rose.
But before I proceed… Are you two close?"
"Please Doctor, go straight to the point." Shadow hissed, trying to be as polite as he could be.
"Ok, didin't meant to offend you Sir." he paused and took a deep sigh "From the preliminary examinations, we detected some congenit malformations on her left temporal lobe, wich can trigger some of seizures like you saw today. My bet is that she has Temporal Epilepsy, because we had acess to some of previous medic examinations and crossed the info.
Its treatable with proper medication, but she can have a wide range of crisis, since they can go from allucinations to the agressive deja-vús inside deja-vús.
But sometimes the congenit malformations aint enough to trigger such violent crisis."
Shadow was quiet for some few moments while he was carefully assimilating all the information.
"Can I see her now?"
The squirel smiled and simply said:
"Follow me."
The taciturn hedgehog walked behind the medic through the large corridor. Rushed nurses were running room to room to check if every pacient needed something. It was quite late, and Shadow could see the tiredness on their expressions.
"You have 15 minutes, then I have to ask you to leave, because she's exausted."
The medic talked before opening the door and allowing the ebony male to enter.
Amy was sitting in the bed with her back leaning against the headboard staring at the moon. Her expression was a mixture between sadness and lack of sleep. Her face had dried tears and the esmerald eyes were a bit puffy red. She was wearing a pure white hospital sleep gown and her left hand had a catheter were the serum was being gently pumped to the body.
Shadow shivered to the sight… It was way too familiar and his first instinct was to sit next to her and reach her right hand.
His concern was fully rejected when she keeps the hand, once resting in the bed, was now in a defensive gesture, against her chest.
"Rose…" he spoke gently, trying to aproach again, when her feet shake like she was struggling, Amy moves away abruptly, shaking the head of the bed to the sides.
"You once said you weren't like Sonic… But let me warn you, I'm NOT Maria."
The pink female voice was agressive, her hands clenched, squeezing the bed sheets between her fingers. She was afraid of his touch. The seizure were so strong, she though her brain was going to explode.
The ebony male kept the hand to himself and his expression went from soft to serious.
"Don't you DARE to compare yourself to Maria…" Shadow rose from the bed and looked into her eyes:
"Where is your hero now?"
He aproached more with his fists closed.
"Where was he while you were having a seizure?!"
He abruptly hits the table next to the bed, shaking it, aproaching more.
"Oh yeah, he was fucking Sally Acorn!"
He cornered the pink female with his two hands against the headboard, shouting in her face, making some patients to awake to call the nurses and security.
Amy looked silently, straight into his eyes, controlling herself not to burst in tears.
But Shadow, now closer, could sense her racing heart, the salt in her tears, the inconsistent breathing and again the intoxicating sweet scent, that somehow was stronger now.
The ebony male felt a burden once he thought about he just said and his expression changes again while staring at her.
But Amy was hurted from his words and looked down trying to control the huge stream of hot tears accumulating... When she sees his dark hand grabbing her chin and with his tumb, he gently wipes the tear that betrayed her facade.
The pink hedgehog opens her mouth, suprised and paralised as the time slows down again and she sees his eyelids close while aproaching her.
She could smell his musky scent and feel his hot breath almost on her lips, when he suddently went back again, wide opening his eyes while being pushed from behind by a tall white bear, one of the security guards that quickly aproached the room.
"Up! You are pushing your luck Mr. Shadow!"
The security guard exclaimed while preparing to hand cuf him. The killer instinct was sparking on the crimson eyes, when Amy exclaimed:
"He meant no harm!"
The guards stared at her, and the bear pushes Shadow away from the bed, grabbing her arms to check some bruises.
"It was only a small dispute… He wanted me safe and there I went to the roller coaster after taking the meds." Amy said under examinations, now from a nurse too.
The security guards at first thought it was another case of domestic violence, but she had no marks what so ever. Shadow was surprised by the female's gesture and gave a small chuckle.
"No need to escort me creature." and before a blinding light stuns the guards, he smiled to Amy and then desapears into thin air.
The security guards were about to leave and the nurse as well, but the white bear prevented the nurse from turning the light off:
"Next time, he won't be so luck Miss Rose." and the light went off.
Amy gives a fake smile, thinking to her buttons that the Ultimate Life Form almost kissed her and, shortly after, just got another enemy...