A Monarch's Corruption
Chapter 4: The New Castle Acorn

Tails knew there had to be some way of getting into that castle without being seen. He wasn't sure how he would do that, but he just had to try. Tails folds up the letter from his parents the slips it into his satchel where it would be safe. Tails then heads over to the front door ready to leave his home and find that way to the castle. He was determined to.

"Halt there!" says a voice suddenly behind Tails as he was closing the door. Tails immediately froze in his steps and raises his arms above his head, he not sure what he might have done. "Turn around now and tell me what you were doing in there? Vandalizing an abandoned home were you?" asks the same voice.

Tails keeps his hands up in the air as he turns around to see who it was. It was just as he expect. Not far from him was another Dark Legion soldier with his blaster pointed right at Tails. Tails had to keep his cool. If he were to run or react in some suspicious way, this soldier might take things the wrong way or try and arrest him. If that were to happen, then Tails was most likely going to be thrown in the dungeon as well just because of who he was.

"No sir, I wasn't stealing from this home, but I did think I saw someone else in there burglarizing it. He was just going back in a second time to get more old furniture when I saw him. You might want to go see if he is still in there." says Tails quickly thinking up another excuse to get out of trouble again. He wasn't sure if the echidna was going to work but he thought he might as well give it a shot.

The soldier was hesitant at first, but he eventually put his gun down and made his way over to Tails slowly. "You had better be telling the truth. Now move out of the way and let me check this out citizen." says the echidna soldier putting his blaster back up to his shoulder and slowly starts to enter the house, he not watching Tails anymore.

Tails couldn't believe that had worked, but seeing that soldier just walk past him like that and into the house, he got a pretty sneaky idea that left a soft grin on his face. Tails turns and begins to quietly follow the soldier into the soldier into the house. The soldier turns around hearing a creak on the floor and points his gun at Tails again not sure who that was at first, but he soon just shaking it off and looking the other way again. "You're lucky I don't have a trigger happy finger fox. Now where in this house did you see this intruder?" asks the soldier looking around again only seeing three doors in the current room, so he knew he had to choose the correct route or the intruder might get away.

Tails carefully shuts the front door behind him quietly as the soldier said that to him. "I think I saw him head straight ahead." says Tails. When the soldier turns to that direction, he facing completely away from the fox, Tails makes a quick dash forward and shoots his hand out delivering a swift karate chop to the back of the echidna's neck, dropping him immediately to the ground with a loud thud of the wooden floor.

Tails lets out a relieved sigh and kneels down to the echidna just to check his status to make sure he was unconscious like he had planned to do. "Good, he's out. Now is my chance." says Tails as he grabs the echidna and grunts pretty hard as he begins to drag him into the room that he had just told the echidna to head into. He leans the echidna up against the wall of the old guest bedroom and just lets him stay there for the moment.

"I guess I better hurry and get this over with before he wakes up." says Tails as proceeds to take off his utility belt, his satchel, gloves, and his boots as well. He carefully and neatly placed this on the ground and heads over to the unconscious echidna and starts to try and undress him. It wasn't that hard to do, since most legion all wore the same long black robe. When Tails gets the robe off, he just leaves the echidna lying on the ground in nothing but his boxers, he having taken the black gloves and boots from him as well.

When Tails is fully dressed in the robe, the first thing he does is pull the red face mask over his face so that he wouldn't be seen that he was a fox and keeps the hood pretty tight around his head. He wasn't going to allow himself to be discovered like this, which would be disastrous. Tails then scoots over to his satchel, reaches in and pulls out the rope Mina packed for him. He then reaches in his utility belt and pulls out the pocket knife as well. The rope wasn't that long, but this was a perfect use for it. He proceeds to push his pocket knife into the middle of the rope and saws right through it cutting it right in half.

Tails scoots back over to the echidna and pulls the echidna's hands behind his back and ties them together with the first half of the rope. He takes the second half and ties the echidna's legs together as well. He wasn't taking a chance of this guy waking up early and alerting others of his presence here. Tails takes the tape he brought as well and puts some over the echidna's mouth just to be on the safe side as well. He picks up the echidna's identification and blaster and stands back up looking exactly like a Dark Legion soldier.

When he was ready, Tails makes his way over to the front door and shuts it closed once again just the way he left it. If he was successful he would be back later to do the exchange over again. Tails makes his way down the street trying to walk as casually as he can, so that no one would think there was anything different between him and any other soldier walking the streets. It did seem to be working though. Not one person was questioning him as he made his way towards the palace just ahead.

The black palace had changed a lot since the days of Sally and Elias being on the throne for the time they were. For one, the castle used to be white, not black like it is now. There were more towers that have been added over time, but also a lot of spikes have been added to the sides or tops of walls to make it look more dangerous and scary looking it seemed. There were guards everywhere around the palace. Guards standing on balconies, guards on the roof tops, about two dozen making round trip patrols around the outside of the castle, and four more standing at the main entrance as well. It was very well guarded.

Tails makes his way over to the main gate where one guard holds out his hand to Tails. "ID soldier." he says to Tails. He quickly pulls out the Identification that he took from this soldier and holds it out to the guard. The echidna pulls his hood off for a moment, showing he was very dark red echidna with all his dreadlocks made of metal, so that he could get a closer look at the ID. "Alright Corporal Conner, you're clear, but may I ask why you have your mask down?" asks the guard handing the ID back to Tails now.

Tails does the only thing that comes to mind and starts to cough some and make his voice sound scratchy. "Oh that's because I have a cold and don't want to spread it around." says Tails and coughs some once again after he finishes saying that. This making most of the guards step back some when he begins coughing. "Oh uh, sure, go right ahead sir." says the echidna and gives three knocks on the front door. There was soon a clicking sound before the door slowly started to crack open to allow Tails to go inside.

Tails sighs happily, he not really able to believe he had just gotten away with that, but apparently either he was smarter than he thought, or security wasn't as tight as it could be around here. Tails makes his way into the main hall of the castle, and stops dead in his tracks. He couldn't believe what he was seeing; the interior had been completely changed to the point where he barely recognized the place anymore.

The walls in here were painted black with red stripes all over the place to make the room darker, even in the day time. There were lit candle along the wall to bring some light into the room, but there were lights were positioned in such a way to make it look slightly creepy. Statues of Shadow as he used to look were placed in various places throughout the hall, along with more statues of Maria. The countries new flag was hung on the wall in a couple of places. There also several paintings of Shadow, Maria, and other echidna's that most likely high up or important people to shadow if they can get their faces on his castle walls. Shadow had really giving this place a much more gothic slash medieval feel that it used to.

The hall was full of more guards that were there just in case, but there were a couple of ordinary citizens waiting around too. They either there for a tour or waiting for an audience, but either way, the guards were watching them closely as they browsed the artwork here in the main hall. Tails looks around for a moment before he sees one of the side doorways that he recognized and heads down it into the halls of the castle. He wasn't going to go near the throne room, just in case Shadow was around.

Tails makes his way down this dimly lit hallway as he proceeds to look for the way to the dungeon. He was pretty sure he knew where the dungeon was, but with the way this castle had changed, that was going to be tricky. Most of the doors as well now have been made to look older as well, they all made of wood and having small bars on the top so someone could look in and out, but no one could get into them.

As Tails is walking down the hall, he is being passed by other guards, but none of them are paying any attention to Tails, since he did look the part with his cloak and blaster in hand. Since he had no idea which door he had to check, Tails decided he just better start checking doors to see which ones the dungeon might be. He just walks up to one of the doors and turns the handle to walk inside.

When he walks in, he immediately goes wide eyed. He seemed to have walked into the western dining room, and it was chuck full of Dark Legion guards all eating their breakfast at the moment. He immediately turns back around and leaves without a second thought, he breathing a bit hard now at having seen what he had just seen. "Wrong room." he says leaning against the wall.

It took a moment before Tails caught his breath but when he does, he proceeds to head down the hall once again. From now on though, Tails thought he had better check through the small window first before he enters a room, or else something more serious might happen. Once he was fully calm and brave enough to check another door, he walks over to the door and peers in through the window this time.

When he looks through this one he gets an even bigger shock as he quickly moves out of the way and stands to the side just trying to look like he was on guard like any other soldier might be. Out of the room walked a couple of Dark Legion guards, followed by red female echidna with wild red hair and a couple of metal dreadlocks. She was wearing a near skin tight black outfit with the front open slightly showing her chest. Tails immediately knew who this was and knew if she caught him, he was toast. It was Lien-Da, Shadow's head general coming from her personal quarters and seemed to be heading back the way Tails came towards the main hall. Tails quickly gives her a salute, which she returns and passes him by without giving it a second thought.

Once she had passed, Tails basically collapses onto his bottom and leans up against the wall. He was breathing pretty hard now, he just relieved he hadn't been caught by her, but his nerves were starting to get to him. "I can't believe I'm doing this. This is harder than I thought." he says to himself. He sits there for a moment before another guard comes walking down the hall and looks over at Tails sitting on the floor like that. "YOU! No breaks! Now get back on patrol!" yells the guard startling Tails to his feet, and quickly gives the other echidna a salute to show respect and runs ahead some to get out of his way and act like he was behind on his patrol.

Once Tails had made it down the hall a little bit, he simply starts walking again to go back to acting like a guard on duty. He was about to head back and try the east hall when he reaches the end of the east hall, he having gone completely around to the back of the castle it seemed from this hall and there stood two guards in front of a particular door, this one actually having a label on it with the word dungeon over it. "Of course the room I would need would be guarded." he says to himself and makes his way over to the guards to try and figure out a way inside.

The guards look up seeing Tails and hold out their hands again. "Halt, are you the one here to relieve us so we can go to breakfast?" asks one of the guards, the other one taking his hood off, He looked tired from the way his eyes had black marks under his eyes. He was most likely an evening guard and was looking for his relief so that he could go eat and get some sleep.

Tails couldn't believe his luck. He quickly nods and makes his voice all scratchy again as he talks. "Yes, you two may go ahead. My second will be here soon, he was running late, but told me to go on ahead." says Tails trying to sound uptight, but does cough like at the front door. These two looking pretty happy and immediately start to walk back the way Tails came, to go get something to eat. When they were both gone, Tails pushes open the dungeon door and heads inside.

When he goes in, he immediately has to proceed down some stairs, which was typical of a dungeon for one to have to go below ground to get to it. They were a pretty long flight of stairs, but eventually Tails does make it to the bottom. When he gets there, there were a couple of torches on the wall and a couple of cells around him, but most of them looked to be empty at the moment, there was one rabbit male asleep on one of the cots in one of the cells, but he was it. He was most likely someone that got arrested and was serving his time down here.

Tails proceeds further into the dungeon before he comes to another big door with some heavy locks on it. He reaches out and pulls the handle but it was locked. Tails was about to look around to see if he could find the keys when he simply looks to the left of the door and sees a key hanging on the wall inside a little crevice that was just barely visible. It wasn't in plain sight, but it was just right there. Tails takes the key and unlocks the door with it. He immediately puts the key back and proceeds into this room.

This was another part of the dungeon, but in here, there were arm and leg laser chain holders all installed along the wall. Most all of them, were deactivated at the moment but about midway down the hall one pair was active and someone was hanging on the wall, someone familiar looking. Tails makes his way quietly over towards the person hanging there and gasps pretty hard when he sees who it was. It was Rotor.

Just as his parents said, he was still down here, but he seemed to be all alone though. He was wearing some pretty old looking clothes, his arms had red line like blood marks on them, and he had a beard now as well. Rotor looks up when he hears someone getting close and just gives a scowl to Tails showing he was not happy to see a soldier down here with him. "So what is it you want this time you echidna skum? You here to clean or try and get more information out of me?" he asks in a clearly ticked off voice.

Tails did feel sorry for him, but wasn't sure what he could do at the moment to help him, since he tried to get him out of here, he would definitely be caught. "You don't have to worry about anything Rotor." says Tails in his normal voice now instead of the fake one he had been using on his way in here. Rotor though didn't seem to buy into that though and scowls even more.

"Oh, so this time trying the good guy, bad guy approach, well I'm sorry but I won't talk ok!" he practically yells out in furry to Tails and pulls on his chains a little bit. But he had no strength from how the plasma laser chains barely reacted when he pushed forward. After that little outburst, Rotor simply lets himself go limp again in the chain and just lays there.

"Well Rotor, I think you may want to talk when you see that it's me." says Tails as he pulls the red flap up and pulls the hood down showing Rotor who it was behind the mask. This practically startled Rotor more than he had ever seen someone get startled before in his life. "Tails! What the! How the heck did you get down here!" he says looking pretty shocked but also happy to see one of his olds friends here in front of him.

"Shhhh, keep your voice down Rotor. Yes it's me, I snuck in here when I found a letter upon my return telling me that you and Sonic were still down here in this dungeon after all this time. I can see that you're still down here, but where is Sonic? Is he in another part of the dungeon?" asks Tails trying to see if Rotor would be willing to answer some questions with it being him here now instead of a Dark Legion guard.

Rotor looks down for a moment before looking back up at Tails and gives him a grin. "You'll be glad to know that Sonic is no longer down here. Sonic escaped a couple of months back when some guards got very lazy when they had to take him to be cleaned. He knocked them both out and left the dungeon in the same way you walked in, he dressed as one of the Legion soldiers he knocked out and just walked right out of the castle I think. It took awhile before his escape was discovered down here, so I'm sure he got away. The bad thing is though, is that Sonic has been tied up or beaten so much that he was in no shape to run out of here. He was pretty skinny when he left. He might be in shape again or he may not, but being down here with me, he wasn't aging as well as he should have if he had still been active." says Rotor telling all this at once. He seemed to have been dying to tell someone this for a long time and was now being able to just let it out.

Tails was rather shocked but stayed quiet and listened to all this and did feel sorta bad for Sonic. He had been down here all these years and had to simply sneak out of the castle instead of going through by force like he used to like to do just to show off to his enemy. He must have been in pretty bad shape to try something like that. "Well, if Sonic did make it out, is there any way you would know where he went so that I could go find him?" asks Tails hoping that Rotor had told Sonic where to go or Sonic did back to Rotor.

"Luckily for you, we had discussed it for a long time, that if one of us were to ever escape to head to the ruins of our old HQ. I told him to collapse the main entrance and make a secondary hidden entrance so that no one would know he was there while he recovered. If Sonic made it out, that is most likely where he is hanging out. If the place was never raided, Nichole should still be in service there as well. She had a couple of backup hard drives hidden around the land just in case something like this happened and I told Sonic how to find one of them. She deleted herself from the hard drive here in the city shortly after the invasion to avoid capture." says Rotor willingly telling Tails all this classified information that not even he knew.

Tails never knew that Nichole had hidden backups of herself just in case of invasion. If Tails could have her along, that would aid him a lot, and having Sonic would help as well in more ways than one. "Thanks, I'll be sure and check into finding out what has happened to Sonic. You don't have to worry Rotor. I'm going to find a way to fix everything or die trying to at least." says Tails grinning as he walks close to Rotor and pats him on the shoulder.

"I'm glad to hear old friend, but just leave me here. There is nothing I can do to help you in the fight, but give you more information. I'll tell you anything I can that you might need. Once you're done, I want you to sneak back out and leave this city. From what I have heard from other prisoners, it isn't pretty." says Rotor more calmly now looking up at Tails.

"Yeah, it's pretty nuts out there. I doubt if you haven't been out there, you wouldn't want to. But yes, I was planning to also head to Angel Island and find my parents and other friends. The letter I found said they had moved there and I have wanted to find and visit them for so long, after I moved away with Mina." says Tails smiling at that part.

"I'm happy to hear about you and Mina Tails. But yes, if you are going to Angel Island, from what I have heard from Lien-Da when she comes down here, you will want to be careful not to get on the enforcers bad side when you get there. I hear he can be reasonable, but if you piss him off, he won't hesitate to use deadly force against you. I haven't seen who he was, but Lien-Da mentions him all the times in the reports I hear her give from time to time on her communicators." says Rotor.

"Noted and will do Rotor. Thanks, all the information your giving is a real help. I'll go hunt down Sonic first and then proceed to Angel Island to find the others. I sure hope it doesn't take too long to do so, because I hate to leave you down here any longer." says Tails.

"Don't worry, I'll be fine Tails. I've been down here twenty-five years. I'm not going anywhere, so there is no need to worry. Now go ahead and go before.." that's when there were steps being heard heading down the stairs to the dungeon that Tails had come down when he came into the dungeon.

Rotor looks up and now begins to look nervous. "Tails quick, hide! There is a supply closet over in the corner, put your hood back on and hide. Guards aren't even allowed down here sometimes. If you're caught you will be locked up too. When the coast is clear I'll call you back out." says Rotor as he starts to look a bit frantic now.

Tails not hesitating for a moment turns and rushes over into the closet and shuts it carefully. He puts his hood back up, but does put his face up to the small barred window of the door to see what he could see out there. It didn't take him long before the door to the dungeon was unlocked again and Lien-Da walked into the area were Rotor was, she carrying a nice sized whip in her hand. She started to head straight over to Rotor who was looking up at her angrily as she made her way over to him, but she wasn't alone.

Behind her came walking slowly a dark black figure, he was wearing a cape that was pinned mainly to his left shoulder, but did span out across his back. He had a shining gold crown on his head and a very familiar scowl on his face. It was Shadow. Tails gasps but keeps his hand over his mouth so he wasn't found out. It was even worse than he thought. It he was discovered by Shadow himself, there was no telling what might happen. Shadow would be nowhere near as merciful as a guard might be if he was found by one of them. He just stays silent. He wanted to hear what Shadow might be doing how here coming to see Rotor at this moment.

"So, are you ready to talk yes, you stupid purple walrus?" asks Shadow and walks directly up to Rotor and grabs him on the neck pretty forcefully and scowling very angrily. "TELL ME WHERE SONIC WENT! I know you know! TELL ME!" he screams at the top of his lungs and shakes Rotor hard slamming him into the wall a few times as he says that.

Rotor grunts and takes all the blows without losing his cool with Shadow practically beating him with how hard he was hitting the wall from his shoves. "Sorry, Sonic never told me where he was going, now why don't you piss off so I don't have to look at your face you tyrant." says Rotor angrily but in the most calm like voice you have ever heard from someone that was in a position like Rotor was in.

Shadow just chuckles and takes a few steps away from Rotor keeping his back to him. "You do know I could easily have you killed, if not for the fact you contain the secrets I would need to gain even more power. And until you tell me them and where Sonic has escaped to, you will remain down here even longer. You do know that right?" asks Shadow turning back to Rotor grinning.

"Yes I know, and I'm prepared to stay down here forever if it means not helping you out. I would never help you and never will help you, so you better stop trying." says Rotor as he spits on the ground some. Shadow not seeming that affected by the small bit of talk Rotor returned to him.

Shadow simply shrugs now and starts to walk towards the door to exit the dungeon. "Well fine then, I will be heading back up to check to see if that stupid squirrel has been reviewing the papers I told her to be reading. But in the mean time, Lien-Da." he says pausing for a moment before simply smiling to her. "Have fun." he tells her.

Lien-Da just giving off the most evilish grin you have ever seen before she cracks her whip to make it stiff in her hands. "Oh with pleasure my lord. I always do." she says waiting for Shadow to leave the dungeon before she turns back to Rotor and walks directly over in front of him. "You never will learn will you? Oh well, more fun for me then!" she says and slams the whip forward into Rotor, he letting out a loud moan when she hits him. The sound of the whip was making Tails cringe as he hears Lien-Da start to beat Rotor with it.

He felt very sorry for Rotor now, but there was nothing he could do to help him through this. He continued to hear crack after crack of the whip and Lien-Da actually laughing as she was whipping him with the whip. "Having fun now! You get one every week and will every week as long as you keep this up!" she says and starts to cackle again as she cracks the whip against Rotor again, his moans ringing out throughout the dungeon with each hit. Tails couldn't watch this part and looks away and just waits for her to finish. He didn't want to watch Rotor get beaten like this.

Lien-Da was whipping him for quite a bit longer than Tails thought she might be doing so, but eventually she does stop. Rotor was breathing pretty hard now and bleeding a bit on one of his arms from the new red line marks on one of them. "Well, hope you had fun then. I'll be bad later to check on you." she tells him before she pretty quickly goes over to the door and leaves the dungeon, her heals heard as clicking the stairs a moment later as she was leaving.

Rotor looks up weakly towards the store room door where Tails was hiding at still. "Come on.. out now.." he says in a much lower voice than before. Tails quickly heads on out of the supply closet and right over to Rotor worried about him after he had been beaten like that for almost no reason than Lien-Da seemed to enjoy doing so.

"Rotor are you ok! You're bleeding!" says Tails putting his hand to one of Rotor's shoulders to check him out. He couldn't believe she would do something like this and seem to find joy out of it. She was cruel, but Shadow seemed to approve of her doing this as well, which scared him even more.

"It's fine… I've had worse. I think that was one of her easy ones. Don't worry about me though. I'll regain my strength later when I get brought a small bit of food to eat. Tails, get out of here and go find Sonic before they do. " says Rotor grunting a bit, because his arms were hurting from the beating, but his chest hurting more, but he wasn't going to tell Tails that, since those scars were hidden under his shirt, along with the many other ones he hides under his shirt.

Tails backs up pretty slowly at first not really wanting to leave Rotor alone like this but does soon walk over to the door and begin to open the door again. "Don't worry, I will find him and find a way to get you out of here soon old friend. I'll be back." says Tails putting his hood and flap back up, after taking them back off after coming out of the closet and leaves the room now. Rotor just letting himself go limp now again to try and rest and fight off the pain.

Tails quickly heads on back through the dungeon and up the stairs back into the hallways. He shuts the door just in time to see two guards turning the corner and heading towards his position. Tails walks casually past them as they go over and stand in front of the door he had just come out of. They were most likely the real new shift guards coming to guard the dungeon. He had just gotten out of there again before being caught coming out.

After making his way back down the hall and on through the main hall again, Tails walks over to the front door and quickly begins to make his way out and back out of castle. The guards at the front door see him leave and wave to him. Tails does give them a wave back, but he was moving rather quickly as he wanted to just get his stuff back now and get out of this city. He couldn't stand to be here any longer. The things he has seen truly disgusted him and he was mad and upset.

When Tails makes it back to his parent's old home, he just walks through the front door and makes his way back into the guest bedroom. He sees the echidna on the floor wiggling around some, he having woken up like he figured he was going to by the time he got back. He didn't have to think twice as he bent down, grabbed the echidna, startling him since the echidna didn't know Tails was back, and slams his head against a wall to knock him back out again. "Sorry, but I will be needing my rope back." says Tails.

He waits until he is satisfied with the echidna being knocked out again before he undoes the ropes from the echidna and soon pulls the rope off himself and throwing it in a wad on the floor. He quickly sticks the rope back into his satchel and begins putting his own gear back on. He was in a hurry, but also just wanted to get out of this city now.

Once Tails had all his gear back on him, he simply leaves the echidna lying there on the floor and leaves the house. Tails heads right for the city gates that he came in earlier. He knew the guard would question him, but he already thought up what to say when he left. He didn't care about all the lying he was doing, he just glad he had gotten in and out without being caught doing this.

When Tails reaches the gate, the guard on the inside now was the guard from outside before, he apparently switching with the one that was on this side while Tails was in the city. "You get your ID sir?" asks the soldier to Tails the moment he saw and recognized him.

"No sir, they told me, since I come from another village that I should go there to get my ID. I would have gotten one, but they said I had to go to that village to get a proper one. I'm sorry. I will be back if you will let me out to go get one?" asks Tails trying to make himself look as innocent as possible so that he could just get out of this city as fast as possible.

"Fine, I think I understand. Guards, open the gate, let this fox go, he needs to go procure some ID and needs to go to another village to do so!" yells out the soldier up the guard that sits in the little guard house at the top of the gate. The guard nods and the gate soon began to open up for Tails. He didn't waist one moment before he begins to walk out the gate.

Tails walks a little bit away from the gate before looking back and seeing the gate be closed not longer after he had left it. Tails just gave a small scowl and kept on walking as he looked back. "I hope that the next time I come to this city, we are here to take it down." says Tails and just keeps on walking this time, no longer looking back.

To Be Continued….