Disclaimer: I own nothing of Sonic and the characters presented here.
8: Vicarious Pursuits
It wasn't the instant flood of light from the threshold, nor the slamming of the door against the wall when it flung open that woke her.
No, it had been the footsteps. A slight pause as if the person had a limp, a foot that seemed to lightly drag over the carpet that gave her alert mind the warning that her new day of captivity had begun. Her eyes remained closed; her left black wing instinctively covering her white-furred head to shield her from the bright yellow light. She recalled before she finally dozed off that she had purposefully laid down, her black clothed legs still covered with her knee high white boots pointed toward the wooden door to the room her captors had literally carried her into–
His voice came across faint, but strong, almost more as a taunt than a command.
"Git up..."
Breathing through her black nose, Rouge froze over the sky-blue sheet covered mattress. It wasn't that she was afraid, her waking heart proving that notion as its pace quickened from hearing what she new had been a heavily Soleanna accented voice. Islands, southwestern–Spanogian Sea? Her geography was relatively sharp, considering she needed to be proficient with regions, societies and cultures in order to know what origins of the jewels she had stolen to strategically place them in the right market for, well, resale.
But she remained rooted on the hard mattress, her left wing still hovering over her head, her eyes itchy from the short nap she let herself take...showing whoever stood in the threshold, his silhouette transposed against the hallway light, that she would fight for the dominion her captors were trying to impose on her.
It worked!
"I said git up!"
She half expected a kick from the male being, but it never came. His voice barked to her–high, sharp.
Lethal.
This time she let her wing fall close to her arm, allowing a gesture of obedience. Eyes attuned now, her soul now steadied, readied for malice driven towards her in place when she traced the male's lone, tall pointed ear on the right side on his rounded head, his left ear she barley could study being crudely disfigured, rolled over as if it had been shriveled from fire.
For it had.
Her heart bore to a place of safety she knew she wanted to retreat to, but a quick scan of the now lighted room found none. Rough wood paneling had been the bars to her imprisonment. Only a small bathroom, surprisingly clean when she discovered it after the rough reception and release of her bonds–the black nylon seat belts that they had cut and fashioned from her limo–the black bag lifted from her head, and the ear pods removed, giving way to a low hum of central air...and crippling silence. With no reference of time, and the bathroom the only source of light, she had waited for an unknown duration; stopping her heart beating at a ravenous, fearful pace; listening to footsteps; taking in her surroundings; smelling the dank, humid yet, chilled air. Once the initial shock and adrenaline subsided from her mind and body, her surroundings and the care of them told her they had been planning on taking her for sometime.
From here on, everything needed to be done purposefully, and calculated to the tiniest of decimal increments of when to be executed if she were to survive.
Rouge took in a deep breath, leveling her eyes to the sunken, narrow pupils glaring at her from across the gulf between them. She swung her legs over the rough spring mattress, and planted them on the brown carpet. Wings back, and chin slightly raised, she stood, her hands still gloved and at her side, fingers balled, eyes slightly narrowed–
He stepped further in to the small room, crossing the line of demarcation she knew was mostly meant for her, and sidestepped into the light.
The horror she lay witness to only magnified what she knew the black-furred jackal had endured. Silver streaks of fur faded down the center of his face and muzzle. White long hair floated over his right shoulder. She could only see his color mostly from his right; his balled hand hanging; his face firm with simmering anger, his white front fangs peeking out from under his lips like nubs of submerged stumps in a pond. His left hand, however, floated next to his waist, his arm up, bent at the elbow, his hand scorched to a roseus blotch that blotted amongst the lingering black and peach skin, hoovering next to hilt of a sheathed dagger tucked inside the waist band of his black, fitted slacks. A dagger her heart had snatched a memory of its shape and curvature like a narrowing s-curve of a road, yet, having a patina of carbon and pot-marks having its ebony wooden handle burned. The last remnant of a certain jackal she felt the world was not missing.
But the one in front of her?
The left side of his face was nearly an identical match as a canvas of burnt flesh of his hand. Almost like a sunburn across her own exposed skin.
Yet, his mere presence, his black fur on his right side contrasted his black vest and long sleeve shirt with a white tie underneath the vest, his black slacks, all tailored close to his lean body, wasn't what had made her stiffen to almost stone. The burns...the marks...the glass left eye she could see staring right through her, his right eye boring straight in to snatch her soul...
Chaos burns.
The recoil her soul lurched from brought that face of the master she was certain this jackal had once followed. The grey muzzle, the dead yellow iris and black pupils, the raw power...the utter arrogance of achieving that ultimate power.
Infinite.
He had been reduced to ash. Shadow had seen to it. And what remained...it was glaring straight at her, bypassing her well endowed chest and fine physique...demanding her death. The detail of which was strong behind his eyes. A rage like no other.
His face, his narrow muzzle, held a repose of professionalism, however. He may have been uncoupled from moral constraints–his body posture giving her no illusions of the designs forming within the storm behind his eyes to be unleashed against her–but the slow turn, his body angled to point to the opened door down the small hallway past it indicated that he was bound as a servant...willingly.
"...Out..."
Disciplined. Seasoned–honed–experienced. She fought her mind from racing to panic, failing as her inner-being felt cornered...outmatched in skill of deception. Escape would not be easy, if not impossible due to what was directing her every action.
Him. And she swallowed as shallow as possible, for she knew she had had a hand in creating him.
Shadow–somehow he had done the rest.
Stepping forward, her eyes ever locked to his, she turned and glided forward, focusing her trepidation on the soles of her white boots, her fear at the tip of her thin, limp tail, and her senses searching for freedom.
He seamlessly stepped behind her, Rouge feeling his steady breathing near her neck just to her right. Straying her eye to her left, she descried a small corridor with dark impressions of three other doors to the left side, none to the right. Four steps forward through the brown wallpapered hall she began to hear the chatter of voices and china being scrapped with metal utensils. Her black nose tingled with the smell of bacon and eggs, and the her blood began to charge with the hint of coffee that swirled together with cigarette smoke. Passing the lone source of light from a wall mounted lamp with a tiny pale shade atop it, the glow a warm amber that made her think of sulfur, the room where the jackal was leading her was dark and large from what she could see.
Stepping through the passage, she glanced to her right to find a staircase that was hidden by a wall adjacent to it. She spied the brass banister rail anchored to the inner wall...and the tan furred lynx, his black furred ears a dead giveaway, his left fang exposed from a sneer, his pants black, his t-shirt white, his short barreled blaster carbine a deep grey, its origins from Soleanna given by its protruding energy cell from the bottom near the trigger guard, and the polymer hand guard from the exposed, short barrel, the skeleton stock folded. He cradled it like it was a mere possession, though his finger hovered close to the trigger, his thumb atop the selector ready to drop it from safe to fire.
Her mind stayed on course, eliminating the dashed hope she had to run down the stairwell, and now searching more of her surroundings for more avenues–
"Left!" The jackal's hand slammed her right shoulder, the force more telling than crippling.
To her left was a long, occupied table closest to the wall she forcefully rounded. Three of the same shaded lights from the hallway she had come from dotted the wall, the other side two windows, shades drawn, the morning sun fighting to peak through.
The gorilla that had yanked her out of her limo was seated at the end in a high back black leather chair that was more fashioned for a human than an Islander. Yet, he was of the size that it fitted him, his head buried in a plate of eggs, bacon and toast. Green pants adorned his legs, his chest exposed to the air with his black fur, and chiseled exposed skin abs. He was a stark contrast of what sat next to him. Another lynx, wearing green pants as well, blue gloves laying next to his arm, and wearing a black tank top and blue boots with gold lightening marks etched in each of them held his attention to her, his eyes leery of her, his lips devoid of emotion. An empty high back leather chair high, pushed in, held the space which separated the lynx from a blue feathered hawk, who was hovering over a plate nearly empty of scrambled eggs.
Past the hawk, she could plainly make out a red leather high backed chair with what seemed like burnished copper rivets that were tacked to the leather of the Victorian era looking frame. A side-table to its left seemed to balance a metallic saucer of some kind. A flatscreen T.V. hung on the far wall, its screen showing the image of one of the around the clock news channels. She recognized the anchor, a white human with long hair wearing a yellow blouse.
"Well, well...well. Look what the jackal dragged in!"
Rouge's eyes, scathing when she glanced to the other side of the table, felt the burn of hatred when they locked onto the blue hues of the green hedgehog that had placed her head unceremoniously in a black bag from last night, coupled with the most annoying songs for the past ten years beating in her ears.ྭ Her emotions still lay confused. For one, he had Sonic's voice.ྭ And two, he wasn't the blue cobalt hedgehog she hoped would come through the whatever building they had her in. And two, he wasn't the blue cobalt hedgehog she hoped would come through the whatever building they had her in.
Or Knuckles for that matter.
The jackal rounded her right side, firmly grabbed her arm, and pointed to the empty chair between the lynx and the hawk. His voice slithered with a heavy hiss. "There. Sit!"
Letting her eyes turn, she met his red glass eye. It was hollow–very much like his soul. Deadness echoed through them to her, along with a blue glow of hot anger.
The lynx pulled the chair out with a suddenness that racked at her, yet she held her posture and visage with a calmness she remembered her father would have had when he someone would challenge him. She hesitated, letting the Jackal get consumed in her stare. Searching for more if she had seen him before, her mind stayed blank. She could only harken back from the distance where she remembered she had stood–two years before. When Infinite had become engulfed with the Phantom Ruby; her hands holding Shadow's inhibitor rings; the roar of the black hedgehog's voice when he unleashed his chaos blast, ending Infinite's vicarious pursuit of the world's pain.
And what came of the Phantom Ruby that had possessed him?
Rouge's eyes gave a slight jerk from the thought. Her heart quickened, feeling as to push out from her chest.
Breaking her stare, she focused on the blue eyes of the green hedgehog who was giving her a smirk under lusting eyes. She thought to cross her arms over her chest, to hide the trough her womanhood that seemed to draw his eyes. Instead, she took the tall chair and planted herself in it, only giving a slight careless glances to the lynx, then to the hawk with drawn eyes of disdain to him.
Her heart, however, was far removed from calm, cool, or collected. The two Islanders next to her were the only warmth from the chill crawling up her spine.
"Come'on, boys," the green hedgehog announced with an air of greed and command, "let's make this gorgeous specimen feel at home." He then gave a sudden scoff. "Well, at least our home!" He leaned in towards her. "Your's is probably way too fucking pink and girly for us!"
The taunt was there, his arm folded under him next to his half eaten plate. His red framed sunglass was still atop his head, close to his pointed ears, peach skin the same, along with the two scars she could now clearly see under this tan furred chest. She just held her voice, her stare.
But the green hedgehog didn't bat an eye to her. Instead, he leaned back in his chair, balancing it on the two rear legs, and hit the wall behind him with his fist. "Hey, Snively! Bring up some grub for our guest." He then slammed back down on all four legs of the chair, almost pushing the table forward, his eyes meeting her scathing look again. "I like my victims a little thick. Makes nap time soft and cushy!"
She held her tongue. Even if she were to say something she felt he would throw it right back at her just as quick. Instead, she tilted her head, letting her blue eyes find the something she needed to get her–
"I pray..." The jackal's breath was acidic as his voice over her neck and right ear, "what hope you have abandons you!" She let her widen eyes drift over to catch his callous burnt face and glass eye ripping into her.
Motivations of what her captors held jumbled up at a juncture in her mind; which one to get through and be true she had no notion. Money? Hostage? Revenge? The latter was very much in the jackal's presence. But again, she detected a restraint, as if he was employed by someone for his honed skills.
Which very much made him a former member of the Jackal Squad.
He stood up, his posture erect, and gave a deadpan look to the green hedgehog across the table before he stepped away from her and went to the red leather chair to her right. His limp she had heard when he came to her wasn't as pronounced in his gate as she had figured, but it was there. Dragging the edge of his black pointed, shined leather shoe across the carpet, he seemed to have effortlessly carried himself to the left of the chair. With a care that had suspiciously reminded her of Shadow the Hedgehog, he leaned down, his black furred muzzle, his lone ear high and attuned, and spoke something to someone she couldn't see when his face disappeared between the chair and the blue hawk sitting right next to her–
A pale hand...human, feminine–it seemed to materialize from the chair toward the jackal. A burning cigarette pinched between the thumb and middle finger, it glided to the large metal ashtray before stabbing it inside. It looked like a small head...a skull with the lower jaw missing, the bottom keeping itself from rolling over with a golden band across the upper part of the head.
The jackal rose, his eyes coming back to hers, his disdained laden voice echoing back to her: What hope you have abandons you.
A short silhouette rounded the far wall, Rouge quickly concluding there was another stairwell.ྭ Human, short, his eyes oddly vacant, his walk carrying him to her with a hint of mechanical discipline.ྭ Three paces later she traced the bald head that seemed to have the shape of a deflated balloon, his nose long, his hair non-existent.ྭ Yet, his skin, white in complexion, but dull like leather, he carried a tray with a full plate of food.ྭ He stepped behind her, his right cheek upturned to her, giving her a comforting, allaying glance that still didn't make her feel any better.ྭ He placed the white plate down in front of her before taking and scattering a knife and fork made of plastic. The plate held a steaming pile of scrambled eggs and five stripes of bacon that made her question if they had a decent cook amongst this den of curs.ྭ Her own cook staff at her casino probably couldn't do it as well.ྭྭ
"Thanks, Snively," the green hedgehog announced with a smirk. "Now...back to the kitchen!"
The short human had a green overcoat that hid what she thought was a white long sleeve shirt underneath. His pants were black, his shoes the same...and his expression blank with black eyes. If the hedgehog had directed his remark to her as he had to this human still holding the tray, it would have elicited a scathing rebuke from her. Yet, the human didn't nod. He didn't even tilt his head, but instead turned and marched away from her and the long table. The blue hawk didn't even make a remark, either.
"I wonder how he'd handled prison?" the green hedgehog bolstered.
A light chuckle came from the lynx beside her. "I think he'd have great range of motion after picking up a shit ton of soup!"
"More like pushed in!"
Ignoring the hedgehog's emphatic eyes and remark, she eyed the jackal, his black vest, shirt and slacks becoming a dark abyss with his white tie being the beacon that kept drawing her attention to him. At this point, Rouge felt he was the most dangerous person in this large room that resembled more a dinning hall or banquet room if anything. He stood by the red leather chair, his head tilted towards it, his own eyes meeting Rouge's. What rage he had was more of an opiate than a tool of direction. His hands went behind him, close to his disfigured black bushy tail. Giving a nod, the short human man stopped and looked to the unseen woman in the chair before both he and the jackal turned and disappeared behind the wall. She could hear their steps as they descended, but not before she caught a wry smile, and a hint of a wink from this Snively man back toward the woman in the chair.
Affection.
But none was she currently getting from the green hedgehog in front of her. His scarred chest rose from underneath his open black leather jacket. His sneer was still there. "Where are my manners–" He looked around the table, Rouge following his quick glance "–Oh that's right, I flushed that shit back on Mobius!"
Mobee-ous? Where's that? Rouge tried to grabble with.
"So," he gestured, his white gloved hand extending to the blue hawk, "this is Predator Hawk–the one that dropped your security guy from sky." He then crossed over to the lynx at her left shoulder. "And this is Lightening Lynx–" He leaned in to her "–And he's as crazy as me!"
The voice beside her gave her no illusions. "Hi..."
She allowed a look toward him, keeping her poker face tuned to non-caring.
"And! I can't forget our resident sapian of muscle and reservation–Sergeant Simian." The gorilla never looked up from his clean plate, only casting an eye to her. Something in his posture and demeanor conveyed resentment...but not at her. Yet, a breath in brought back the image of that same gorilla hurling her driver up into the night sky. She could still hear the glass shattering from across the street.
She exhaled, her voice filtering with it in a low murmur. "And you, since you're obviously not Sonic?" Just the way she said it was like a twist of a concealed knife into his ribs just between his twin scars. She crossed her arms, taking care she had done it across her upper chest.
"Oh damn, bitch, starting with that shit already!?" He held up his wrist, absent of a watch but mocking like he had one all the same. "Shit, it isn't even nine, yet, and I'm havin' to already think about beating the fuck outta you?"
Morning–names, she gasped, yet noted to herself. The green hedgehog was being very cavalier about his information. It made her very unsettled. Motives were becoming more clear, and worse in her favor. She hid her swallow, but kept her even stare to him.
"So, do me a fucking favor–besides maybe undress for me– "This made her narrow her right eye, instantly! But he leaned in toward her. "Stop calling me the fucker's name!"
"So, what am I supposed to call you?" she protested, keeping her husky voice firm over her tight face.
His eyes brightened, his mouth twisting. "Scourge," he let slather from his lips. "Damn fine to meet you."
She offered a sly smile. "Can't say the same."
He shot his hands to his chest, feigning as if his heart was stopping. "Oh...I'm touched!" He looked to his comrades around her. "I think it's love, guys!"
The hawk nudged at her arm with his elbow. "Hey, now, don't you go breaking my bros heart so fast!"
"He's already gone through so much!" quipped the lynx beside her.
"Oh, no!" Scourge mockingly placed his hand on his head. "Rejected again!"
"At least this time it's a real woman!" the lynx laughed!
Scourge nearly stood up, leveling his brightened face to Lightening and pointing to him. "Fuck! You!"
The lynx matched the hedgehogs tone. "Nah...I'm good!"
Rouge showed she was not the sort to placate them by stiffening her crossed arms over her chest. Yet, she still couldn't subside her pounding heart. Every sneer; every mocking glance at her made her fall back to her last level of training. At this juncture, it was to hold her poker face to them. Her search for motives, however, still hadn't come up with results in the hour she needed.
Instead, she gave a dismissive snort and glanced back over her right shoulder. The two windows with the blinds drawn had her intrigued with the thought to bolt with the chair in her hands, to smash a window if she could throw it far and hard enough, and to take flight. In which direction she didn't care. She just needed to get away.
Are they this sloppy? Her answer was a resounding no when she spied what seemed to be bars on the outside of the window. No...they were comfortable in exposing themselves to her. And that frightened her the most.
Turning her head back, the woman's hand was still extended over the armrest of the leather chair, a remote settled effortlessly in her palm, her thumb hovering over it, yet the channels on the TV were changing without her input.
I must be seeing things.
"C'mon! Eat!" Scourge nearly thrust his voice at her with his hand waving to her. "Don't make ole' Snively waste his talents on you turning your nose up!"
The aroma before her was enticing as her last meal had been about five in the afternoon, yesterday. Adrenalin, however, still lingered in her stomach from last night, along with the thought of the plate of eggs and bacon being somehow tainted. The thought of being drugged and at their mercy quelled her hunger.
"I'll pass," she remarked dryly.
Scourge's ears perked with this, twitching as a devious smile stretched across his face. "Fine!" He leaned across the table, coming up from his chair, "More for us, eh guys–"
"BOYS!"
The sudden high command from the leather chair, her voice like a sharp spear but meant to be more of a bludgeon stopped the green hedgehog almost dead. This time his smile was cut loose to a silent growl, his eyes locked to the back of the chair.
Silence now permeated the air. Rouge's own breathing had stopped long enough to hear her heart pounding to the tips of her ears. She realized that the eyes of the hawk and Scourge where all fixed to the red chair, assured that the lynx behind her was doing to the same.
The woman finally spoke, her tone subtle, mothering. "Scourge...darling. Could you be a good boy and go downstairs to make sure everything is ready?"
The green hedgehog backed down into his chair and gave a short pause before he answered, his own voice leveled with obedience. "I can..."
"Then please do so," the woman replied evenly. She took her hand with the remote and placed it on the small table beside her. "Oh...it's best we keep Simian and Flying Frog here. The news seems to have a slight description of them."
Rouge's heart wanted to leap from this. It was good news. The people she was hoping for were trying to find her.
"How did they find out?" blurted out the quick tone from the lynx behind her.
"I don't know, Lightening. But it's best they stay here and watch over things." Again, the unseen woman's tone was caring, yet commanding.
A moment elapsed from the table, until Scourge rose. Rouge kept her eyes on him, not knowing what he would do, even under this new supposed leash. He edged his hand against his mouth to shield his voice from the woman, yet he was still audible to Rouge. "Okay, the Cast Iron Bitch gave us stupid orders. Let's go!"
They rose with a disorganized clamor, Rouge only noting the large gorilla was the only one reserved in his posture and eyes. Something isn't settling well with him, Rouge observed. Reading people came as natural as breathing for her thanks to her father's teachings, and her mother's insistence later. The lowered shoulders, and the slow movement to clear his end of the table with his plate and drink told her this Simian had reservations in what he was doing. Nevertheless, all four of these Islanders, the one who called himself Scourge retreated to where Snively and the jackal had disappeared with only the hedgehog saying something that caught her ear–
"Remember that time Sonic thought he had Fiona all to himself. Fuck me, I love that heartbreaking fox!"
She squinted her eye, her mouth opened with a perplexing frown. What? Who's Fiona?
Their chatter became more muffled the lower they went down the unseen stairs from the wall in front of her, her ears standing tall to capture every wavelength she could.
Nothing.
And for a time it was just her, and the woman still sitting in the red leather chair.
Silence, save for her breathing, the low hum of the central ventilation, and her inner voice trying to pick apart what this Scourge had said about Sonic and a Fiona. Sonic didn't have a love interest, except maybe Amy chasing...
Her eyes narrowed when the woman's hand placed the remote down on the table, the television still on, a camera filming, panning at what she realized in horror and relief all at once of her sliced in half limo on Broadway Avenue. A glimpse of a tall olive skin human under a dark suit, then...A brown echidna? She squinted more, leaning her head and shoulder while keeping her rump planted on the leather seat. She saw he had black hair, his brows large and possessing the same black color along with his suit. Then, she thought she spied another echidna, his fur burgundy under a black suit jacket, his back to the camera–
Her heart leapt when her widened eyes caught just for a fleeting glimpse of Shadow, clothed in a suit as well, his black shirt opened to expose just the upper portion of his white furred chest. He will find me! She shouted in relief only to her self. But her voice nearly fell to her stomach with the thought of the jackal that had woken and escorted her to where she now sat. Do they know–?
The television screen blinked off when a picture of her just came on, Rouge puzzled how it did when the remote wasn't in the woman's open, limp hand. It had been her profile picture that she had plastered all over the advertisements to her casino. Save for the lights on the wall in front of her, and sunlight leaking through the drowned blinds, darkness tried in vain to consume the room. It slightly won, but her pupils were now dilated enough she could still make out the large table, her plate of offered breakfast that she still didn't have the constitution to consume...and the tall woman slowly rising from her chair.
Rouge could tell she was wearing something not quiet long, yet it was modest in concealing her slender frame, her shape yielding a subtle hour-glass figure. A deep breath confirmed she had long hair, pulled together with three rings evenly divided down the length past her lower back. She turned, her face was shaped with a contour as if wind had softly eroded it. Eyes forward, she looked towards the unseen stairs behind the wall, her lips seemingly painted black, her brows possible relaxed, as if the woman did not care about Rouge's presence.
Rouge watched her reach down to a leather case on the end-table, doing so with a care that Rouge instantly read as someone who possessed a refined sense of self, and pulled another slender cigarette from it. Placing the holder down, the woman retrieved a lighter that she recognized as a dragoons head only when it's mouth illuminated as the woman flicked it alight. The woman's eyes glared back at Rouge's as if thrusting a needle to stop her heart. Rouge had never seen yellow eyes on a human before. They glimmered with the flickering flame that produced a bright orange glow when it lit the cigarette. Her brows were thin and black, her sockets slightly sunken, sharp at the corners. Yurashia? Rouge filed the thought in the back of her mind, though it was curious that the woman's stature seemed tall for a Yurashian human.
The woman leaned down at the end table and picked up the silver saucer she was using for an ash tray, but not before she placed the cigarette between her right hand's ring and middle finger. Her eyes were focused, yet narrowed in a soft appeal to her. Rouge narrowed her own, not to match the look of the woman but to study her closely. Something crawled up her spine about her, sending more warning cries to her than the black furred and scared jackal had. The green hedgehog just at this point creeped her out.
No... Her inner-voice echoed a caution, as if she mentally took a step back, but in the corporeal space and time, she shifted her posture to face the woman more, crossing her left leg over her right thigh. The brief moment she could descry the woman's slender legs, Rouge started to build the profile of the woman who was now silently picking her way to her. If she were the predator in this equation, her first inclination of the woman was that she had a high air of herself. But the slight turned up cheek, her eyes meeting Rouge's studying gaze, told her there was...or had been a real reason to possess this arriere cloak around her. Rouge closed her wings around her shoulders as if making her own. It was a guarded gesture she had allowed to be seen. Something in her instincts told her to do so.
Green hair? She could just barely make out the emerald green strands that had escaped the three metallic clasps. They flowed through the heavy air...
Salt air?
Rouge's ear twitched when she thought she her heard the high cry of a seagull from outside. Shore...coastal. And it puzzled her more since Station Square was not anywhere near a large ocean. That was nearly a hundred miles east of the nearest shore line, or a few thousand miles west. Where the heck am I?
The woman's lips parted to form a wry, disarming smile to Rouge. She was wearing a dark crimson kimono, bold black panels in a shimmer of silk seemingly draped over it. Pale skin, Rouge eyeing a hint of it from the woman's exposed chest from the v-folded cloth opening. Rouge figured she didn't have to be completely jealous of the woman's bust if her height and scale were the same.
But it was her erect posture as she glided to the chair Scourge had vacated a moment ago that both intrigued and worried her. Power. Her mere presence possessed it. Yet, there was a cool glow of anger–resentment–that Rouge felt wasn't truly aimed at her, but it commanded her to respect it all the same. No...she had lost it. Just the way she held her head high enough to have the decree that Rouge was beneath her, an aristocratic air of meager disdain, yet, she held her open, musing smile just off-center to her left side intimating that she had lost her privilege to a kingdom...and not by circumstances of her own.
Placing the metallic ash tray down at an empty space on the table, and taking her right hand to slide Scourge's empty plate to the side with a gentle push as if it were rubbish–yet lucky to be blessed with her grace–the fair skinned woman, her green hair moving over her right shoulder as she tilted and moved her head to weave it around, she slowly sat down, her eyes never leaving Rouge's the whole evolution.
Silence. It poured between them like a flood into an arid valley. Sighing, the woman raised her right hand, and with the cigarette still held at her middle and ring fingers, took a slow pull from it that made the tip glow. Her yellow eyes were sharp with constructive designs of malice aimed at Rouge's own. The bat's chest rose slowly from the soft inhale she took from her nose, keeping her gaze narrowed slightly, only to let her eyes drift to the ash tray–
It was a metallic skull, its lower jaw in fact still there, yet, not welded together, but clasped to an odd ball-like hinge to either side. Like it had been cybernetic. The eyes–red lenses staring at her from the upside down death grin. It had been a primate of some kind. And it never tilted or rolled with the gold band around the forehead seeing to that, a red ruby at the embedded in the center.
A crown? she mused in a slither of horror.
The woman brought her gaze to Rouge and followed the bat's eyes to the robotic skull. "Oh," she allowed, her voice low, even, yet high in tone as if offering a pardon as smoke left her lips and slender nostrils, "I'm sorry. Don't let Khan upset you." Her head and yellow eyes returned back to Rouge. "His use these days is rather...unfitting for him."
She rolled the cigarette to the tips of her lean fingers and taped a small clump of ash into the skull before she placed it from edge to edge at a small circumference to let it rest near the start of the moneky's teeth. She exhaled from her lips, the rest of her drag leaving her lungs. Her right hand went to the bottom fold of her kimono above the black sash closing it over her body and pulled a fan that she opened into it's full crescent shape, possessing a color and design pattern that Rouge was unfamiliar with, and wafted it and the smoke away from her with an experienced movement that was smooth and elegant. And with a small wave, she closed it as quick as she had opened it and placed it next her, again, in a calm, purposeful fashion.
Rouge saw that the woman seated across from her must have indeed possessed power or rule. How, or where it had been stripped from her, she could only fathom. From the stare the yellow focused eyes gave her, it had been violent, as violence lurked behind her stare.
A moment passed, Rouge feeling it calculated to unnerve her. To wrestle control between them. Rouge knew the woman was showing she held the mercy of her life from those who the woman commanded. Her presence and movement telegraphed that much to Rouge.
And the woman reached out with her right hand and extended it to Rouge. She held it out, her fingers angled down not in show of weakness, but as an olive branch of kindness. Rouge couldn't accept it as anything more than posturing to gain something from her. For she had done the same thing to others...to her victims in the past.
So, what is it you want from me? she quizzed, not letting her stern face lapse as she took the woman's hand with her own white, elbow length gloved right hand.
The disarming smile returned. "Regina," she allowed softly, "Regina Ferrum."
Rouge felt Regina's hand grip hers with a strength that surprised her. It hadn't been that her hand was longer or wider, since she was human, but it was the slenderness that had a firm grip after all.
But it held another message...Don't underestimate me...
"Rouge," she returned after a few beats of her thumping pulse, keeping her voice neutral. "Rouge the Bat."
A wry smile formed from Regina. "I'm afraid I know much about you, Ms. Rouge."
Oh, really?
Apparently the comment had echoed in her visage, Regina slightly tilting her head as if pinged from her thought, commanding her to pull her hand away from Rouge's. The same hand then retrieved the smoldering cigarette in the same manner between her middle and ring finger. Rouge couldn't but watch as the woman took another pull, her hand concealing her lips doing so. It was as if she were ashamed of showing her slavery to the nicotine. Or was she showing she was the master of it? Still, she breathed out the smoke from under her concealed face, her eyes attuned to Rouge.
"I'm sorry for how my Destructix have been," Regina said, flicking a small string of ash in the metallic skull. She turned her head toward the wall that lead to the corridor down the concealed stairs. "They...they've been finding adjustment here a little strained." She returned her eyes to Rouge's. "Considering this isn't their natural habitat."
Rouge's right eye narrowed, keeping her arms still crossed above her chest, wings still around her shoulders. "Are they always like this?" she remarked, breaking stride of silence. She still noted the only one of the bunch that seemed out of place was the gorilla, Simian.
The woman didn't respond, only folding her arms below her on the table, taking a caring visage to Rouge. "You should really eat. You will need your strength today...for us."
Rouge strayed an eye, but only slightly, to the plate of food before her. For us? she rolled in her head. Again, lists of motivations where growing shorter. "I'm sorry, but I'm not in a trusting mood," she muttered tartly, "and after last night, my appetite was blown up...along with my security detail."
"It was unfortunate," Regina said, her eyes coming away as if Rouge's mark hadn't hit. "But, you are here. And with us." She took another drag, this time holding in her intake, savoring it...along with something else.
Rouge said nothing, her ears swaying to pick up as much sound as she could. She indicated heavy footsteps below her, the low hum of the central air system. And her and the woman's breathing when they both seemed to exhale, a light cloud rising from Regina. "Am I suppose to be impressed, or something?" she guided with a spearing tone.
In turn, Regina gave a dismissive frown, breaking eye contact. "No. No, not really." She then took her cigarette and stubbed it inside the skull, Rouge noting it had only been half-way smoked. "We just needed you."
"For?" Rouge hissed. Eyes locked for a short beat of her heart before Regina darted hers back to her left. She finally released her fingers from her cigarette before weaving her fingers underneath her chin. Rouge didn't let the silence take hold. "You know, you could have just come to me–asked for me–at my casino instead of killing six men and kidnaping me."
"Kidnaping?" Regina offered with a sneer. "Such an atrocious word for what my Destructix were able to accomplish." She leaned in. "I prefer abduction." She let her remark hang in the nicotine singed air before leaning back, waving dismissively. "Besides–a woman of your stature–I'm sure your door would have been open to anyone?"
This caught Rouge off-guard, her face reacting as if the barb were true. To a degree, it was.
"So," she continued, "we opened it for ourselves."
"I hope it was hard!"
The outburst made the dark green haired woman's yellow eyes light up. "Oh, no," she smirked. "Actually, you made it too easy."
Footsteps climbed the stairs, the jackal appearing, rounding the wall with Rouge's white handbag gripped tightly in his hands. Yet, her voice hesitantly slipped through her lips. "How did I make it easy?"
And he opened her bag and upended it, her possessions, and with it a fraction of her dignity, was spread across the table in front Ferrum. The woman never let her eyes leave Rouge when the jackal shook the bag. The heap from her purse lay like trash in the street.
Rolling her fingers out of agitation, Regina began to sift through the clump, Rouge watching with gritted teeth. Picking up a black disc, the woman let a smirk come to her. "Touch up–" she picked up a black tube "–mascara." She lifted her eyes. "Oh, yes. Being blessed with long lashes–it's a girl's best friend."
Rouge gave a subtle blink, her eyes half hooded, her left shoulder sinking down with her arms still crossed over her chest.
Picking up another disc, this time blue, Regina opened it. "Ah, your eyeliner." She placed it neatly next to her folded fan. She then looked up to the jackal. Rouge had hardly paid him much attention, only seeing that his glass eye was dead set on her. There was a delight behind them. As if he was relishing everything before him. She felt she was being chewed up by him with Regina there to make him mind his manners.
"That will be all, Mori," Regina said.
The half scared jackal gave a short bow of his head to Regina, his scathing eyes still to Rouge. Even in the dim light of the large dinning room, if it was even that, she could still see the deep rosaceae from the chaos burns on his exposed skin. His wilted ear. Turning, what was left of his fur side concealed under his nearly formed fitted suit–minus the jacket–to her, he drifted with ease back to the corner before rounding it and descended the steps. Rouge could make out the limp from every step he took.
"Vanity," Regina let slip in the heavy salt and smoke mixed air, her hands up but her eyes drawn to what was left of Rouge's purse's contents she hadn't scoured, yet. "The most assured thing a woman will have." Letting her eyes become leveled to Rouge's, Regina picked up her black cell-phone from the table. For a quick moment, Rouge's heart pulsed as if it were able to swallow a morsel of hope. Since her phone wasn't in the faraday bag, and hoping the right people were looking for her, her phone's signal should have by now been pinged by a local cell tower.
Regina pressed the button that lit up the phone, but the lock screen was asking for her trace code to unlock it. Here, Rouge smiled, tightened her arms and fingers around her well endowed chest. No way she was going to open–
Regina gave a slight swipe with her right hand just over the screen of her phone...and it unlocked the screen. Rouge's eyes widened, her poker face nearly smacked out of her when she saw the icons for her apps and the photo of her in front of her casino and black limo she got from Smilebook come on the small rectangular screen. And the woman's eyes had lit up, her yellow hues briefly a slight glow of green. There was no time on the screen. And Rouge's heart sank when she glimpsed that the signal meter icon was blank.
So, no...no one is going to know where I am.
"You see, Rouge," Regina began, her face mute with emotion, "it was rather easy for me to not only find you, but to get you."
The bat lowered her wings but not her guard. "So, you stalked me on Smilebook."
"Oh...you let me. In fact, everyone on this planet, it seems, is so open to letting someone like me into their lives."
Rouge caught the words, understanding them but lost in their meaning all the same. It must have shown on her face.
Regina never thumbed an icon, but it seemed she merely looked at her phone and her Smilebook page came up. How? There is no signal?
And the woman deliberately slowly recited her last post from the night before after she ended her call with Honey. "On my way back to where I started...from nothing on a street with good people and businesses." She looked up from the screen to Rouge before leaning forward towards her. Her yellow eyes became slits. "How thoughtful. A woman of your stature paying a visit to the people you've grown apart from? You'd make a decent queen if you had a kingdom."
It was something behind Regina's voice when she said her last remark that Rouge caught. A hint of sorrow; something lost. "I don't get your drift," she let slip.
A shrug from her shoulders and face. "Considering you've written a biography on your page, and with the people who want to do you harm from your dealings–well, I'm surprised your security hadn't said anything about it." Regina leaned forward. "Course, you're–not–the–only–one."
"What do you mean?"
"Well...it seems everyone loves their new found vanity on these devices. Posting up where they go, what they eat." Again, she waved at her own thoughts with a smirk. "Even so much as recording their everyday lives–as if they're their own little star to a show."
Her eyes glowed green, lifting her hand up and waving the edge of her fingers at Rouge's phone. A bronze furred badger appeared, her brown ears high, her twin pulls of long hair back behind her head, her face wide with anxious panic. "Hey, guys," her voice pleaded, "Sticks here! I just heard that, these signals–from our phones–they are tapping into our minds. I think it's Eggman. I think he can still do things from prison. Maybe the metal virus and the cure was just to get him easier access to our minds! Maybe –it's the U.F. government's trap...through us! I don't–"
Regina waved her hand again, her eyes soften back to their yellow hues. "Government...Eggman," she muttered highly, shaking her head gently. "Fear of the known is an easy fear." Lifting her eyes to Rouge, she gave a foreboding smile. "When it should be someone like me they should really fear. The unknown...anonymity I could only dream of. And the best part–sadly, not for you–is I didn't have to leave the comfort of my chair to track you down." She leaned in once more. "You just offered it to me freely."
"What?"
Footsteps began to climb the stairs again, Rouge ignoring them.
"I guess it's the price you have so cheaply paid to let people think you are one of them."
Rouge this time leaned in, unfolding her arms and placing them beside the now cool plate of eggs and bacon. "Well, everyone has a price...big whoop."
With this, Regina's eyes widened. "Oh, yes. Everyone has a price...me...you."
Cocking her head, Rouge kept her stare, only seeing the green hedgehog in his black leather jacket had rounded the wall from the corner of her eye, his hands behind him. Mori, the jackal, she felt his mere presence crawl up her spine as he followed Scourge from behind him. "So...what's yours?"
Elbows to the table, hands leveled to rest her chin on, yellow eyes conniving. "It's not my price you need to worry about. It's me finding yours for what I need from you."
Rouge let her right eye narrow, her fingers now beginning to the claw at the table's edge. "You want money. Fine! We can make a deal! I'm sure you have something to offer that I'm willing to pay–"
"No," Regina said, shaking her head. "No, for what I'm needing from you, I can't pay with fiat money, or species."
Rouge noted Regina's usage of the two words that meant to pay with cash or gold. She also noted the green hedgehog stepping beside her, only eyeing the jackal stepping beside Regina. "My ransom gonna cost that much?" She scoffed, "I may be worth a lot, but there has to be a ceiling even I can't fly above."
Tilting her head, Regina lowered her gaze and hand to the table.
And to Rouge's quicken pulse, she picked up a small silver key amongst her make-up, cellphone, cleaning wipes, and lotions. "I'm not after your money...or your ransom," the human woman offered with narrowing eyes, holding the key up pinched between her pale fingers. "No, what I'm wanting from you is in safe deposit box B–zero-three-two at the First Federation Bank on Fourth Avenue in Station Square."
The hesitation to speak made her mouth fall slightly, trying to deny what her large white ears heard. They had, somehow, found out her secret. One she even had kept from her closest friends. An insurance policy for her that she had wondered now if she should have let it lapse, maybe even given it to Shadow as an olive branch to secure her past crimes for freedom.
But now!? What freedom would she have?
"No...I'm not giving that to you!" she fired back.
Lifting her chin up, her eyes now casting down her nose, Regina nodded to Scourge. "Well, then I guess we're going to see what your price truly is."
The green hedgehog stepped next to Rouge, his arms quick, his hands the same. A quick snap of cold metal clasped around her throat that she felt squeeze her blood and air from her head. "With this necklace, I do be wed!" Scourge laughed with contempt.
Her hands shot up to her neck, her fingers coming to grip the metal ring that was smooth in touch and figure, rounded against her neck, but flat on the outer, thick shell. "What!?"
Mori extended his hand to Regina, a small cylindrical object in it, handing it to the woman. She took it without turning her head, placing it under her eyes that beamed to Rouge's frightened gaze. "Do you know what this is, my dear?"
Rouge kept her teeth bared, her eyes the same, as her only offered answer to the question.
"This is your price," Regina this time shot back with stern yellow eyes. She had taken off her mask. "Your head still attached to your body. A bomb is sitting in that necklace you now have. I've found that bombs in people's bodies seem to be quiet the motivator in getting what I need." The end of the device Regina held in her hand began to glow blue, Rouge having no allusion it was the remote detonator. "I had to rearrange a poor echidna woman's face because she though she could out bitch me." She then exaggerated a sigh, her eyes baring down with a resolve that warned Rouge not to test. "Be a shame to do the same to you. You are much prettier than she was."
More footsteps came beside her, surrounding her. Still, she kept her hands to the ring that was around her throat. The bomb. She had no choice. Her eyes widen with the conclusion; Regina smiling with it.
"Again, sorry for what I'm having to do. But, again, I knew what the price was going to be." The woman leaned back, pulling the detonator close to her middle. "Your life..."
Hands went to her arms, pulling them back. She tried to fight them off with her wings, but hedgehog, and looking to her left, the lynx she remembered was named Lightening, they had closed their bodies to her to prevent her from using her last limbs of defense.
"Take her to my chamber," Regina announced with an air of royal dignity. "I'll let you freshen up in my chambers with your belongings. Don't worry, the bomb around your neck is waterproof–" she examined the detonator in her thumb "–and I believe this is as well. I'll be holding on to this before I give it to Scourge when you two venture out to get me the thing I need from you."
Rouge festered as she struggled with the strong arms and hands around hers, her mind perplexed and panicked in the same fleeting breath.
The hedgehog leaned down to beside her face, his breath rancid. "We're going to have a nice afternoon, together. And I want my girl to look good around me. Can't be cramping my style."
Mori began dumping her makeup back into her white leather purse, but he left her cellphone on the table. Regina, instead, picked it up, looked it over, then waved her hand over it. White smoke filtered from the edges, the screen lighting up before going blank.
And with it, destroying Rouge's last hope.
Before she could breathe, before she could protest or yell vulgar names to the woman in the black and red kimono, Scourge and Lightning pulled her backwards and up from the chair. The long backed chair crashed against the carpeted floor, Rouge's boots landing on it when they nearly dropped her. She wriggled to fight, but the powerful arms and hands of the lynx and hedgehog pulled her to the left and back towards the corridor Mori had escorted her from.
The black corridor where hope had in fact abandoned her.
Regina rolled the remote detonator in her hand, her yellow eyes watching her steady feet take each step down to the sanctum below her wooden walled kingdom. She felt the twinge from her lungs begging for another smoke, and she sequestered the pull with a intake of heavy, ozone filled air. The lamps on the wall were dim, but the florescent and LED lights overpowered the large walled cavern she descended to. Mori was behind her, his limp steady with his gate descending the stairs.
Landing to the bottom floor, the smell of the once warehouse and salting room of freshly filleted fish still lingered, though removed for some time. She had to give the white albino echidna her thanks for helping her find this planet Earth. It was a treasure of unbelievable value for her. A dopamine rush for her given and learned powers.
Looking right, her scathing eyes found their intended target.
He was hunched over a large metal work table, the cubed emitter they received from last night in front of him, its wires severed and exposed from it, his hands working a lean soldering rod. Regina crept next to him, placing her left hand gentle, lovingly on the short man's shoulder. She could feel the coldness from him, his skin was cracked and almost ashen, his few follicles of hair steady on his head. Yet, her heart still pulled to him like it had in the past. She fostered her eyes to him, but not letting her attention stray. She couldn't afford to.
"My men are set," Mori said quietly behind her.
She turned to him, nodding with her eyes closing on him. It had been mutual with the jackal, his lone erect ear coming close to chest height to her. Handing him the detonator, she sighed. "Take care of that. And mind Scourge with it. I know you two can be oil and water."
He took it, but shifted onto his only hip she knew was still functioning correctly. "I'm more worried of Simian." His sharp stare matched his lean voice. "He seems contentious?"
Again, she nodded. "Chacal," she offered, "I wish I had found jackals of your caliber long ago." She hesitated, but brought her hand down to his exposed, maimed skinned face. "If I had met Infinite before Shadow had," she spoke softly, touching him with her right hand, her left still on Snively's shoulder. The warmth of his exposed, burnt flesh radiated through her. Mori leaned his head, taking in her touch. "All this wouldn't be burdening you."
His hard blue eye, his glass eye vacant with life, aimed to her. "I want 'si bat when you are through."
Regina smiled, taking her gaze over to the back of the large hall to her left. "You'll get what is left of her after Scourge has had his time with her...and only after."
He nodded, though his voice came out like a needle. "As long as she is still breathing."
Again, she allowed a nod, only letting her stare from the back of the hall go to Mori before she broke her eyes when she heard heavy footsteps coming down the stairs to their right. Scourge appeared, his sunglasses still atop his head, his mouth in an euphoric sneer. "All is well?" she asked the green hedgehog as he stepped to the grey concrete floor. Her voice marginally echoed inside the large room and long hall to her left. She could see the black silhouettes of their acquired vehicles in the corner of her eye, five in total parked close together, along with a white van, sheltered from prying eyes from the outside.
He kept walking past her, but his eyes kept to hers. "She's locked in, your Majesty."
"Good," she replied, ignoring his barb to her. "Lets hope she looks good for her afternoon."
Mori stiffened. "The news is all over her."
And Regina nodded with this. "And I'm hoping so."
Tilting his head, the jackal, his white hair slightly long but moving with it, held his face to hers before looking behind her. Regina could feel he was studying the hedgehog, but also the long corridor to where the rest of her new Comitatus Clan were readying...and waiting. "And the black hedgehog?" he asked with acid seemingly foam at his lips.
"You will have your vengeance," she said, her yellow eyes echoing her assuring answer. "I'm certain he will be where we need him, today."
His glass eye burned to hers, his lid to it had been cooked off, never allowing him to blink. "You–are miztaken, Bride." He held his tongue, her posture unmoved from it. "I seek retribution."
All she could do was nod to him. "Just so we are clear, my decree is of the upmost importance. I hired what was left of your Jackal Squad as I needed trained hands for this. But my bargain still stands...you will have him, either directly, or not."
Not taking in a breath for fanfare, only closing his good eye before giving a curt bow to her, he stepped away, she only following him with her yellow eyes until she saw where, and who, Scourge had stopped in front of.
She was immobile. Shut-down, yet standing in the corner inside a glass sarcophagus.ྭ The fox, her red fur gone, her skin a shin of metal that traced her trimmed figure that gleamed slightly, her eyes open, yet vacant in an abyss of black. And Regina watched as Scourge tried to lift his finger up to her, stopping in touching her through the glass. What visage he had of demented designs, of cruel motivations for others had vanished. In their place, longing...fear. Loss.
"Scourge," she pressed softly, taking the needed steps to him, only stopping as if an invisible tether was holding her close to her Snively.
"I know," the green hedgehog had breathed in, a hint of sorrow floating from him. "But I still want to."
She sighed inwardly, holding her stare to the back on his quills and head. "We are almost there. And we will have Fiona back for you."
He held his hand to the fox's face behind the glass, only to relinquish it, knowing of the possibility of the Metalvirus latching on to him if he were to push through the glass. To shatter it to get to her. All he could do was touch it; reminding him of the barrier between living, and dying from love. Regina had stopped it, but not soon enough for it take Fiona. The girl's venture on Earth came at the wrong time to scout out the inhabitants. And the red-fox was still paying for it.
It was too bad the cure didn't seem to agree with Fiona's genetics and her blood.
Letting her stare break to the opposite corner, her yellow eyes laid on the other victim they had brought with them. An echidna, his hulk frame metal, red with paint, but scarred from the marks Sonic had landed on him...the Sonic from her past that had helped dethrone her. She smiled inward with the thought, thinking still how she had dethroned a King. One that was swallowing her ashes in death.
Before the flash.
She looked down to her only possession she cared for. His hands were still working on the inside of the cube, the emitter taking a more refined shape on the inside.
"Snivel, darling. How's it coming? A poor kid lost his life over this."
The nearly bald Overlander looked up to her, brimming a smile of affection to her, aiding, yet straining her concentration to him. "It's...coming along, my love. Soon, it will be ready," he said, his high nasal voice sparking her love for him.
She couldn't help but smile back, her eyes casting to a large metal box, its design heavy in mass, a large power cable attached to it. "And what was inside it?"
Again, he nodded with a smile. "It is...ready...my dearest."
Placing her hands on his shoulder, she leaned down to him, placing her lips to his smooth head, holding her concentration to him, though her heart pulled at it to break it.
She felt him. Cold was the touch of his skin to her lips. Yet, his smile was warm, his eyes dark with life...and yet, fostering none.
I had debated in creating an original character that would have a large part in the story. Being hesitant mostly as I had intended this story to be told very tightly with a certain set of casts, I had written myself into a corner, and it is why this chapter has come about so late. Mori Chacal (French for Jackal, and a slight nod to Fredrick Forsyth's Day of the Jackal) is still an example that I can still created a real piece of [REDACTED]. His true reason for his placement in this novel is to honestly, plug a plot hole: How did Regina get in bed with what is left of Jackal Squad?
And my question for everyone: How did I write Regina (The Irion Queen)? She is without a kingdom, and I wanted to sketch her vindictiveness because of it. I also hoped I showed it well, especially with what is left of Monkey Kahn.
Please leave a review and Kudos and critiques on my writing and presentation. And thank you all once again.