welcome to the mind of a different kind;

Sonic had a headache, which wasn’t unusual for him. He’d challenge anyone to spend their lives spinning in a ball and headbutting things without having a headache at least 50% of the time. What was weird on this occasion though was that he couldn’t feel the rest of his body. It was like his pounding head was just floating around in space, completely detached from the rest of him.

He opened his eyes, but everything was still dark. It took a bit of blinking and focusing before Sonic realised that he was looking at shiny black fabric with just a fine line of black stitching running vertically to help identify it. Leather? The ground beneath him was rumbling as though he was in transit. Like on the mothership maybe? Had he been captured by the Chaos Council again? No – he was back in Green Hill, wasn’t he?

Whatever he was in jerked as they hit some turbulence, and Sonic became aware of a female voice saying something about water. A vision of a wine-dark lake shooting towards him pushed its way to the front of his brain, followed swiftly by a tumble of new memories. He wasn’t in Green Hill, he’d come through the Void with Nine to… somewhere. Somewhere where they weren’t a fan of non-humans, Nine had said. Sonic wiggled his shoulders slowly, starting to get some feeling back into his arms – which were twisted behind his back and restrained by cool metal – while a male voice he didn’t recognise started talking about rings. This felt like a good situation for some rings, but unfortunately for Sonic, the male voice was correct to say he didn’t have any. The Void had come so suddenly he hadn’t thought to try and ring up before running right at it.

His legs were restrained too. Having regained feeling and awareness, Sonic glanced downwards. Huge metal cuffs were clamped around his legs and a twine of thin, green-yellow rope had been wound around his torso so he couldn’t even flap his elbows. The only thing he could move was his head. Well, and his mouth.

“‘That thing’?” He grumbled. “I’m a hedgehog, dudes.”

It was really hard to see much other than the sheet of leather his head had been shoved into. Sonic wiggled like a worm, trying to get a better look at what was lying next to him. It was also black, but a different kind of matte fabric, and curved around something roughly cylindrical in shape. A leg? Was there an Eggman sat next to him?

“Hey, what’s up with the cuffs?” He asked, trying to wiggle further down so that he could see the possible Eggman better. “Can you sit me up? I can’t see anything. Also, who are you guys? Where’s Nine?” A shot of panic washed away any remaining grogginess and he raised his voice. “Nine! Nine! Where’s Nine?”