Shadow of a Doubt

Recovery Mission

The room was completely cement. There was a mattress and blankets in the corner and a door to a small bathroom. A couple candles sat around, partially burned down, so obviously used before.

One wall was covered in carved tallies. They were in no particular pattern. Just all over the place. There were so many, it would have take a minute to count them all, even in the groups of five. In the centre of the wall, "Rebirthday: May 5th" was carved in big letters.

Oh God. Shadow thought. That was over four months ago.

In the centre of the room, a stretcher was casually discarded. An IV bag was hanging above, tube leading to the body on it; obviously Maria.

The little robot tending to the drugs feeding into the IV said, "Dr Robotnik! She's still resisting the sedatives, but I've almost got her unconscious." Turning to the door, it was startled to see the hedgehogs there.

Silver crushed it against a wall using his telekinesis.

Maria was on her side, turned away from them, but slowly moved onto her back at the sound of metal crushing. As she did this, Shadow walked up to the stretcher bed.

"Ooooooooh. Hey, Shaaaadow." Her words were slow and slightly slurred. She couldn't really focus on his face, eyes half lidded, so he didn't know if she was really seeing him.

As her hair fell around her, Shadow could now see a thick metal collar around Maria's neck. Matching wristlets chained her arms to the stretcher railings.

"Liiiiike my new dudddddssss?" Maria asked. She must have been able to see him looking. "They keep my poooowerrrrs from woorkin'. So I can't stop the suuuurgery."

Shadow didn't know what to say. His heart was tearing up inside him. Seeing Maria so vulnerable after just seeing her so powerful hurt. It would have been a painful sight anyway, but now knowing that this was his Maria... It was almost too much.

He carefully removed the IV from her hand. It reminded him of how he used to watch over the human Maria as she took every new treatment. Specifically, a time where she had to go under for a surgery. She was loopy afterwards as the drugs wore off, a lot like this.

"Whyyyyy so quiiiiiiet? Isss sooomething wrooong? Issss it 'cause you know whooo I aaaaam noow?" She turned her head to look at Silver, who was still in the door. "I toooold you to teeeell them."

"I did, Maria." Silver said, a tear running down his face.

He had always been the more emotional brother. And now all the pent up emotions of keeping Maria's secret was coming to the surface, seeing the place she had been cooped up for so long in person.

"Are you maaaaaaaad?" She looked from Shadow back at Silver. "I think heeess maaaaad." Maria made a pouty face, then blinked really slowly. "I was gonna tell yooooou eventually... T'seeeeeeems the drugsss are wooorking."

As Shadow worked to break the cuffs and collar off without hurting her, Maria drifted off. By the time he had gotten them off and thoroughly destroyed, she was peacefully asleep.

Silver did a quick search around the room for anything Maria would want to to take with her, but there was nothing around to even consider.

Shadow scooped up her limp body in his arms, and turned to Silver.

"I'm going to Chaos Control us back to Amy's. Grab on." Shadow said in low voice.

Silver nodded and put a hand on Shadow's shoulder.

And then they were gone.

~!~

The two appeared in Maria's room and Shadow began tucking her into the bed. Silver quietly slipped out and headed downstairs to fill in the girls.

As soon as he reached the bottom step, Blaze and Amy jumped up from their seats in the living room.

"Silver! What happened? Why are you coming from upstairs?" Amy asked.

"Shadow's setting Maria up in her bed. We just Chaos Controlled in." Silver flopped into the nearest chair.

"What's wrong with her?" Blaze asked, moving to stand beside him, running a hand over his arm.

"Nothing, she's just heavily sedated. Apparently Robotnik has learned from past mistakes and was prepping her to surgically implant the control chip." Silver rubbed his face.

"So he didn't get the chance to do it. We're good! Why are you so torn up, Silv?" Amy asked.

"It's just where she was being kept..."

"What about it?"

"It's just a cement room with a mattress. She literally used cutlery to carve into the wall tallies for every day she was there."

"I guess that's to be expected. Why is it so distressing to you?" Blaze asked.

"Well, she wrote the day Eggman made here in big letters and it was surrounded by the tallies. A lot of tallies."

"Spit it out, Silver. How long was she kept there without us knowing?"

"Since May 5th. Over four months." Silver rested his face in his hands.

"Oh my god..." Amy muttered.

"All this time... We've been fighting Eggman, only for him to go back and ask her again to help him get rid of us. We are so lucky that she knew everything he said about us was a lie and that she's so stubborn." Silver stared at his hands, thinking about the memories he had seen.

"She's been so delightful since getting her memories back. I never would have guessed..."

"None of us would have. Shadow shouldn't have gone. Seeing her chained to the stretcher can't be good for his state of mind."

"How did this day go so wrong after starting out so nice..." Blaze shook her head.