But a Desire for
The weeks passed by. The withdrawal continued. The prisoners, turning into shells of their former selves, were changing and reverting back to their primal instincts. Their resent and hatred for those who imprisoned them was blurring their thoughts, leaving them oblivious to the fact that the revenge they were all seeking would damage them in more ways than one and do more harm than good.
The only thing they came to count on was the single meal that somehow was present when they awoke every morning and that their clothes would always be damp and wet from the frigid shower, giving them severe colds and rashes.
By now, each knew what was wrong with the other but no one faltered and once believed it could be true. They couldn't accept why they were there and blamed everyone outside for what had happened to them.
"Please…please! I NEED MY WORK! Please…just let me have my status calculator. M-my machines…they might exploded. They must need maintenance…" Tails pleaded with the unseen captors, banging on a wall with his fists. "Please, please, please, please," he banged his head on the wall repeatedly until it began to bleed.
"Oh, are you talking to the voices again?" Knuckles asked, standing behind him idly. "Yeah, I talk to them. I know they're there. They told me they have my guns. They told me they were using them, that they wouldn't give them back." He growled and violently grabbed Tails by the shoulders, turning him around and laughing wildly. "Don't ever talk to them…don't ask them for help. THEY DON'T DESERVE TO HELP US!"
Blaze walked up to the both of them, the light in her golden eyes visibly dimmed. "He's right, you know. They're evil. They want us dead; they won't let us do anything. They won't let me use my fire...not on the walls, bed…" She stood her ground, staring straight into space.
From the floor in the center of the room, Sonic sighed and shook his head. "Will you all stop it…you're scaring him! Pull yourselves together." They all paid little attention; Sonic hung his head.
"Ohhh." Amy shivered with pleasure as she ran over and put her head in his lap. "You're so…motivational, my love."
Sonic looked down and shuddered as he stood up quickly. "I'm not you're love. Get away from me, Amy."
"Ohh Sonic…I love it when you play hard to get." She giggled profusely. In an instant, her look darkened and her smile faded to seriousness. "I would kill someone for you, my love. Dismantle them, limb from limb." She hoarsely whispered into his ears causing his heart to stop for a moment.
Rouge, who had been lurking in the shadows all this time, stopped to listen to their conversation. With the way Amy was gushing over Sonic, she often wondered how big her heart was.
"You know, in being a thief there's always something I wanted." She stood in front of the two hedgehogs, the look in her eyes giving hint at her internal imbalance. "I've always wanted a heart. Now, you may think that sounds crazy; maybe it is; maybe these people have driven me to insanity. But who knows? All I know is there are no more things to steal and I've always wanted one."
She paused and rubbed her hand on he chin. "Whether or not I meant it figuratively or literally before I came here makes no difference; I can't remember. But now I want one…" She bent over. Her face was close to Amy's, eyes making the color vanish from her cheeks. "…literally. And with yours being so big and all from the love you have for this hedgehog, I think it is the one I will take."
Without warning she gripped the pink hedgehog off the ground by her collar and lifted her into the air. The pink, bright, and well-trimmed nails she had miraculously kept intact throughout the duration of her stay seemed to grow longer, making their sharpness only stick out more. "I guess I'll just rip it out of you." She smiled casually as she pulled her one arm back, fingers closed together and pointed like a cobra ready to attack.
Sonic crawled on the floor, just observing all the craziness going on around him. It was all sinister, dark, scary…a million thought flashed through his mind of Shadow…no, no, no…himself, committing those terrible, violent crimes; the crimes that killed. Had he killed…?
No, it was Shadow…he was Shadow. The name rang in his ears, pounding against his brain and making his blood rush. He screamed, yelling, wanting it all to stop. "NO!" He let out a long, desperate wail.
The entire clangor promptly stopped; even Rouge held her hand in midair, inched away from Amy's chest. "We need to stop." He panted, looking around at the faces. Each one of them was hollow; they looked more like flesh-eating corpses than people. "Nothing, nothing…nothing is going to change. We can't outrun this fate, and we can't outrun each other…we need to keep our eyes on the common enemy. We need to escape."
At this last statement, a steady stream of quiet chatter sprung from the group. The first to speak out was Blaze. "This can't be done. Nothing can save us from this place."
In recent days, she had broken out in a rash from the cold, wet, clothes against her skin. The suffering had only been made worse by a rampant case of the fleas, which had bitten and infected everyone in the room. The time in there had made her bitter, wavering her metal stability and leaving her hopeless. It was only natural that she would be so critical of such a surreal plan.
"It can be done…" Sonic began.
"But HOW?" she further pressed, heating up.
"We…we just need to get the walls down. Find the door we came through…we can force our way out of here…maybe block the pipes and flood this place; if we combine everything we have and work all our energies away from hatred and funnel them towards this, we could be free."
There was a long pause. "I hate to say it, but he's right." Rouge faced them. "We could all work together…but…for a price." She turned and looked at the puzzled hedgehog. "We want revenge. If we get out of here, we should all help each other get it."
Sonic looked taken aback. For one, revenge wasn't his thing. Two, he couldn't believe Rouge would want to help anyone. The rest slowly nodded in agreement, and then began excitedly talking all at once.
"I want to kill the king! I want to kill the king!" Knuckles chanted. Blaze looked at him in shock and anger.
"I won't allow that to happen" she quietly said, stepping towards him.
"WHY DO YOU OBJECT TO THIS? YOU TRIED TO KILL HIM TOO!"
"I DIDN'T DO-!"
"Please be quiet or you'll be on my revenge list, too." Amy smiled at the both of them innocently.
"If that's what you truly all want…then go ahead. I don't care. But we need to think of a way out, firstly. It might not be easy, but…"
Tails, who had kept quiet for most of this time, snorted out loud. "You think it 'might not be easy'? Escaping here is like trying to escape a federal prison. There are cameras, lead walls, and twenty-four hour security."
They all just stared at him, dumbfounded. "What, do you think you're some kind of genius? How do you know?" Rouge asked bitterly.
Rubbing the still-present red mark across his face Tails backed away from her slightly, yet still maintained a cocky tone. His manners, along with his common sense, had been diminished in the room. "Actually, yes; before I came here I would work on many inventions that helped the community daily: my auto-sewer cleaning system, my rapid DNA tester…not to mention I designed the features and security for this whole room."
He stood there proudly for a second, before being gripped fiercely by Rouge. "Y-You…" her fierceness subsided immediately, as if she had a whole new perspective. "You smart little boy." She smiled sweetly, patting his head in a mother like fashion. Beyond horrified at this, Tails ran behind Sonic for protection as the others looked at her quizzically.
Sonic picked up where the conversation had left off. "So…you designed this room." Tails nodded in proud affirmation, grinning slightly. "So you know all the inner workings…everything?"
Tails looked troubled for a moment, scratching his chin. "I suppose you could say that." Truthfully he was more surprised at himself for not thinking of this sooner.
"Can you get us out?" Sonic grabbed him by his shoulders as Rouge had done but with more force.
Tails nodded once again, this time a trace of worry in his eyes. "I can do this…" He put a finger to his mouth, and motioned for them to all crouch low and huddle. "It's unsafe to talk about escaping now. They have some of the best defense technology and security personnel at their disposal. They could be just looking for a reason to kill us at this very moment."
Picking his head up, he surveyed the room. "Follow my lead. Don't discuss what we do. The bathroom is the only safe place. If I remember correctly, regulations that were later revoked prevented me from installing them there. I built the system in a unique way so that only I could change things, so it is doubtful they added one. I need everyone to cooperate. If even one of you freaks messes up, we could be found out and killed…that's all they want to do, is kill us like we want to kill them."
He looked at everyone's doubtful faces, but nodded confidently as they all broke apart. He quickly departed to the bathroom, his tiny hands shaking with anxiety. The intent was to leave a message in the bathroom; something discrete. Searching frantically throughout the small space, however, he found no writing utensils or surfaces that would help him accomplish this.
As he sat on the toilet in thought, he looked down at a red smudge on the floor. That's when the idea formed. Thinking quickly, he ran back out into the room and looked over each person. Who could harm him without the desire to kill him? Who could he trust the most? His options were limited, and he gulped as he walked up to the white bat.
"Cut me" he instructed bluntly.
"Wha…?"
"Now, do it." He held out his finger in anticipation of the small, stinging prick. As she slashed him across his palm with her thick, dangerous nails he howled in pain. Tears formed in the corners of his eyes as bit down hard on his lip to stop the crying. He ran back to the room, resisting the urge to put his finger in it; he was positive the cut was at least an inch deep. Blood gushing in spurts from the wound, Tails spelled out the first word of his message on the long bathroom wall by guiding and moving his hand carefully in all different ways then fixing the messy calligraphy with his fingers.
Standing back, he nodded and went to signal the others. By his instruction they would be free. And when they were free…oh…the things he would build. They all entered the bathroom one-by-one, expressions ranging from shock to admiration at what they found.
"HIDDN FLOOR PANEL FIND; DO NOT TOUCH. FEELS GEL. BUZZING" Demonstrating his point, the fox knelt down on the ground in the main room and put his ear to the floor while patting the ground and crawling. Knuckles was less gentle and soon began rampantly tearing up the floor with each punch delivered to the ground.
Trying to silently discourage this Tails sighed in relief as Amy motioned him over, having tapped found it with her hammer. The single pad looked the same as any other: white, hard, and smooth. But as Tails dug his hands through it and the tile melted to goo, it proved that this wasn't the case. The gray metal box underneath had wires crisscrossed on the top of the lid with some sparking alarmingly. A number pad was the only way to force it open, with the wrong code resulting in immediate death.
"If you're even less than sure…" Sonic started, but Tails dismissed him with a wave of his hand. As he punched each number, they cringed until the lid slowly opened up to reveal a giant red button.
"RED BUTTON!" Amy leaped out of her sitting position, pressing it with full force. As suddenly as that happened, the lights immediately turned off; all humming noises that they didn't even realize were present until now stopped. "SONIC!" Amy screeched, jumping into his arms. "WHERE ARE YOU, IS THIS YOU?"
"Be quiet!" Tails yelled, now back to regular volume. "Calm down, this is all according to plan." Reaching out in the darkness, he put his hand against a wall and whimpered. After that he smiled and turned to the one next to it. "Yes, here it is."
"What?" Rouge asked.
"Three of these walls have a strong lead wall inside, preventing passage in and out accept when controlled by an outside force. In design, the fourth came out without one…a stupid error by the technician, why I didn't just do it myself is…" He shook his head. "The last wall was replaced by a controlled electrical field. No one has touched it in our time here, thankfully…"
"And you never said anything?" Blaze asked.
"It wouldn't have made any difference in my mind if one of you would have. Anyways, this is our only possible exit out. However, there is nothing humanly possible that can break the wall AND survive the shock."
His eyes brightened at this and his hands shook with delight. "We are going to blow down the wall with an atomic explosion. We could die, or the wall could go down along with everyone on the other side of it; even then there's no guarantee that we won't still be killed."
"You're saying we could live or die or die again?" Knuckles pondered this before smiling. "I like those odds."
"But Tails, w-what…where?"
"Shhh. Just get me what I need and no one gets electrocuted today. I can make due with the materials I have here; the explosive will be unstable…but an explosive is an explosive." With that, he sent the others off on a search to collect any stray items or liquids they could find. Using the dirty plates that were left from their meals, metal rust, toilet water, food grease, battery acid collected from the cameras, and a mysterious liquid provided by Amy, the kitsune genius was soon at work mixing these chemicals by the wall.
As the army of nuts gathered around him through his day long toils he eventually sat back, exasperated. "Finished." He breathed out, seeming more worn than usual.
"Well? Can we go?" asked Sonic impatiently. Tails nodded, his body turned from the rest as his hands worked excitedly about the homemade mix. At once he sat bolt upright, seemingly shocked and afraid.
"What is it, genius? Something wrong?" Rouge tauntingly said. Turning sheepishly to face the crowd, Tails's tongue seemed to be caught.
"I…without thinking I made this…but…"
"But WHAT?" the bat scowled.
"There is no ignition source to light it off."
For a moment, everyone seemed genuinely shocked before mentally slapping themselves on the head. In the back, a cat smiled and stepped forward. "Excuse me for saying so, but for a genius you are quite dull" she said good-naturedly, sending some unusually placed chuckles throughout the room. As soon as she lit her hand, however, the lighthearted atmosphere soon melted away to tension. Moving her hand closer, she scanned the crowd with a worried expression. All of them could die within a moment's notice. Catching her eyes, one tall blue hedgehog smiled through his fear and attempted to reassure her with a thumbs-up.
Nodding, she moved even closer to light it, savoring what could be her last seconds. Even if they did go, she knew they were doing the right thing; they would be remembered for this. They would be the heroes of the insane, the ones who risked everything for defiance of society. Dying would only begin their legacy.
Hello readers! Thank you for sticking with me! In light of recent circumstances, I am afraid to admit that this may be my last chapter. Originally this would have been the second to last, but I believe my time with this story is unfortunatly done :( Instead, I have it in mind to funnel my writing into stories that are a bit more my style. So, for now, this may be the end. One day I might add the final chapter, but for now I believe it is best to leave the story of these misfits as is. Thank you, much love to all who reviewed :)