# Wanderings and Murder - Chapter 1

Author: Chorus the Coyote
Tags: Fanfiction, Series, Sonic, Wanderings, murder

This is a Sonic the Hedgehog fanfiction, though it won't seem that way at first. It will take a few chapters before Sonic shows up, because I wanted the story to proceed logically and eliminate contrivance.
If you liked it, great. If you didn't, tell me why.
Even though he's not in this one, I should mention that Sonic the Hedgehog is owned by SEGA.


I felt
hard dirt underneath me, pressing into the contours of my body so hard they
might bruise. The frozen ground was too hard to mould to my shape, and the
worsening stiffness in my back and wings was making that obvious. There was a
gust of wind. It was colder than my rocky bed, and it smelled like too many
things at once.
A cold
drop of rain landed on my eyelid. I tried to raise my arm to protect my face,
but found that my arm was so heavy it felt dead. I was too tired to adjust my
position, but it was quickly becoming obvious that the discomfort of staying
here would soon outweigh the discomfort of waking up and moving. Another drop
of rain fell, like a poking finger, hard onto my flat nose. I groaned as they
increased in frequency, drumming into my huge, numb ears. My pelt was
plastering to my skin; even my thick fur had a saturation point, and I was
feeling the cold already. It was like my flesh was as soaked in ice as my fur.
I felt
like a craggy monster god of old, awakening from some prehistoric coma. Specifically,
like one who needed a few more centuries asleep. I gave another closed-mouth
groan, and rolled over onto my left shoulder, and then onto my paws. My legs
trembled slightly at first, then hoisted my huge body, soaking wet pelt and
all, into a slouching but upright position. My jaws cracked apart with a wet <i>squelch</i>, and creaked as I
stretched them to their limit in an exhausting yawn. I let my front paws slide
forward in a stretch, trying to resist the urge to lie back down as I sank
lower. I felt something tighten around my upper arms, limiting my movement and
preventing the stretch from being satisfying. I finally got around to prying
open my eyes to see what the matter was.
I had
to blink a few times to get the fluid in my eyes flowing, and when they finally
focussed, I saw I had clothes on. I hesitated to really call them 'clothes' -
they were fraying everywhere they could, and the way they were loose and baggy
in some places, while too tight in others, suggested they hadn't really been
made for me. They weren't dirty, though I'd been lying in dirt; I surmised it
was so tightly packed with frost, it didn't have any spare grains to lodge in
my clothes. I glanced up from my self-inspection to look at the torrents of icy
drops falling in sheets, and wondered if that would melt the frost in the dirt
or just freeze it harder.
I tried
to fully extend my wings, but found the same impediment to my range of motion
there as well. I resolve to shred this damn coating of cloth as soon as I found
a dry place. I glanced around, eyes narrowed against the painful, pelting
darts, hoping to see shelter of some kind. I sniffed hopefully, but I should've
known better. In the rain, the air no longer smelled like too many things at
once; quite the contrary, it smelled like fresh water and nothing else. The
inside of my nostrils stung with the cold air. I turned on the spot, seeing
nothing but bare stretches of sodden misery for as far as I could see, until I
found I could make out a tall, darker shape against the black clouds. I forced
my tired body to move toward it, still irritated by the tight fabric binding
me.
As I
got close enough to see it properly, I whimpered in relief: it was a large,
shoddy sort of house, with the doors missing, but the roof intact. I worked my
legs up from a dejected walk to a lope, brightened by a stroke of luck. As soon
as I crossed the threshold, the scents in the air came back in a rush, so many
at once I had trouble placing them immediately. I let myself collapse onto my
stomach, sending two scents more than any others up into my face; that of my
own wet fur, and that of the hay I lay on. After a few breaths, I began to sort
through the others: dried animal scat, rotten wood, and what might've been
lettuce or celery.
I
managed to find a connection between all those smells, and this structure in my
muddled brain: it was a warehouse on a farm. Judging by the state of the place,
no one had been here in a long time to repair it, or fill it. Perhaps the
miscellaneous vegetables I smelled were things they used to grow here. I raised
my head and looked out the wide doorway. Now that I could open my eyes and see
it properly, the sky was quite frightening. It seemed to extend forever in
every direction, and all of it was boiling black clouds and stinging rain. It
made it hard to believe that it had ever been sunny anywhere in the world.
Remembering
the clothes (which were becoming tighter with being wet), I tried to raise
myself onto my hind legs to free my hands for their destruction. With my tail
trapped in pants, leaving me unable to correct my balance, it took a few tries
and unwieldy wobbling, but I managed to find a position that left me standing
erect, though I couldn't have moved from it without tilting onto all fours
again. Trying to keep my center of balance, I curled my claws around the
collar, and wrenched it as hard as I could. The cloth, which had been pushed to
its limits before, ripped easily with a satisfying shirrrrrk all the way down the
center. A mane of chest fur burst through the rip. I ran my claws
appreciatively through my lightly coloured underbelly fur, tousling it to get
rid of the discomfort the shirt had caused. A quick snap of my jaws to grab the
sleeve and a jerk of my head freed my left arm, and then my right. The remains
of the shirt fell to the filthy hay. I kicked it away, and rolled my shoulders.
I
hooked my thumbs under the waistline of the pants, and yanked. I didn't need to
create any new rips for this one; the seams burst rather easily. I sighed in
relief, swishing my tail and relaxing my stance; standing was not quite such a
balancing act now. Starting with a slow turn of my head to stretch my neck, I
shook off my entire hide, ending with a whip of my tail. My wings, which were
mostly hairless save for some sparse covering, didn't need a drying shake.
Now
reasonably comfortable, I settled down in the soft, if stinking, hay to go back
to sleep, when I noticed something distinctly rectangular lying in the pile of
fabric that had been the pants. Carefully, I slid it out of the pocket with the
pad of one finger. It was paper and stiff. With careful snuffling, I smelled
ink, and salty water through the fresh rainwater soaking it. Not wanting to
damage the note that was surely inside what I now recognized was an envelope, I
resolved not to touch it until it dried, hoping the folded paper didn't stick
together too badly by then.
I
hunkered down on the spot again, when it hit me that I had no idea how that
letter had gotten into my pocket. I supposed someone could've stuck it in there
while I was sleeping in the farm field - but now I thought about it, I didn't
know how I'd gotten into those clothes. Surely I would've woken up if someone
had forced those
on while I slept? But I couldn't remember putting them on myself. I tried to think
back to before I'd fallen asleep in the field, and realized something truly
upsetting.
I
didn't know why I'd come here, or how. I couldn't remember doing it, or
deciding to do it. I couldn't remember yesterday. I couldn't remember anything
at all past the moment the raindrop landed on my eye.
I
couldn't remember my name.
I
bolted upright, hearing my heartbeat getting louder and faster. I could hear my
breathing as well, my panicked, fast breaths. My mouth opened, and I panted in
fear, puppyish whines coming from my throat. The severity of the situation was
beginning to crush me, and I was starting to shake with an icy feeling that was
not the cold rain.
I
dashed across the barn on all fours, reached the wall, turned around, ran back
the other way. I was running up and down the barn, whining, half-crying,
completely unable to stop myself, asking myself the same questions in my head
over and over.
What is your name?
Where did you come from?
How old are you?
What do you like to do? What don't you like
to do?
Who are your parents?
I
couldn't answer any of them, and they wouldn't stop, they just kept spinning
inside my head the same way I was running in circles, tearing the barn apart.
Even my body was all
wrong! Why hadn't I noticed before? The front paws striking the ground in front
of me were not normal paws: they were thick and strong and load-bearing, yes,
but they had thumbs, something that shouldn't be on a paw made for running. My
wings were wrong; they shouldn't be on me, because I was too big and heavy. I
might be able to fly if I tried, but surely if I could run as fast and as long
as I was right now, I couldn't be built for flying as well.
This
panicked sprinting wasn't helping at all. I skidded to a halt, sat back on my
haunches. I shut my eyes, and tried my very hardest to calm down. I couldn't
even manage to breathe slower, but at least I was staying still. I lifted one
paw - or hand? - off the barn floor and ran my claws through my head fur. Maybe
it was something I did to calm myself down; I had no idea. In running my claws
over my ears, I whined to realize they were wrong on me, too. They were too
big. A normal, four-legged furry animal should have ears about a third the size
of mine.
I put
both hands on my head, over my ears and eyes so I wouldn't see or hear any new
horrifying surprises. I could hear my own breathing, sounding like a trapped
animal.
The letter, I reminded myself. You were given a letter. It must say
something.
That
calmed me a little - but only a little. I let my hands fall from my face and
settle on the ground in front of my hind feet. In a sudden flicker of
lightning, the dark shapes of my four paws were lit up in vivid colour; I saw
fur the same dark gray as the rainclouds filling the entire sky outside,
interspersed with red and white, then all was flat black once more. The roll of
thunder that came immediately after was so concussive and imposing, my fur
stood on end with shock. I ducked my head, cowed by the very noise, feeling as
though the sky was falling toward the ground like a fist to crush me in this
desolate, abandoned place.
I dug
into a pile of hay, covering my whole body to feel safer, or at least warmer. I
didn't manage either one; the cold stubbornly stayed in my body, refusing to
fade. The smell of the hay and my own fear-sweat filled my nose as I took a
shivery breath. I whispered aloud to myself:
"Who am
I?"
Somehow,
making noise made me more afraid, so I shut up and lay still. It took a long
time before I had control of myself again; what calmed me was thinking of the
letter, and how all I had to do was wait for it to dry. Then, I could read it,
and everything would make sense.
I
didn't think I'd slept, but it was difficult to say; it was so dark under the
pile of plants, that it was possible I'd shut my eyes and dozed without
noticing my loss of consciousness. I shoved myself up from under the straw,
stretching my wings and all four legs as tall as they could be. I felt blood
flow to the very tips of my wings, and gave a satisfied grunt. I didn't feel
quite so scared as I had before; I was strangely optimistic that reading the
letter would clear everything up. As though it was just some mishap that I'd
been mind-wiped and dropped in the middle of nowhere, and I'd have all the
answers as soon as it was cleared up.
I shook
myself, combing my fur with my claws to get all the straw out. I smiled at how
luxuriantly thick my fur was, layered with coarse, stiff hair on the surface,
and soft, downy fur underneath. My body might seem wrong, parts of it all mixed
and matched, wings with four legs and paws with thumbs, but if I said so
myself, my fur was beautiful.
I
retrieved the small rectangle of paper from the ground a few feet away, lying
next to the damp piles of torn fabric. I nudged it cautiously with one long
claw; it didn't tear under that tiny pressure as I'd feared it would. I picked
it up as gently as I could; it felt so fragile and small in my huge paws. It
took a few minutes fussing to unfold it without running the risk of tearing it
in half, working with the blunt instruments that were my clawed toes.
When it
was finally open, I smoothed it out on the ground and stared at it for a long
moment. The runes scrawled across it weren't legible, or just didn't mean
anything. Confused and with growing frustration, I stared for several minutes,
turning it this way and that with one finger, but the characters written on it
never made any sense.
"It's
garbage." I muttered. My teeth clenched together, so hard that they shook, and
the shaking spread into my hands, my legs, my tail, like it was infectious. My
gorge rose slightly, as though it really was sickness, but it wasn't. It was
deep fury.
"It's
fucking garbage!"
I said, shuddering, deep growls pouring out of my mouth after my words. I
wrenched my gaze away from that awful letter, mocking me with its nonsense
runes and its false promise. The shaking seemed to move along my arm with
fierce attention in the split second it took me to drive my fist against the
wooden barn wall next to me. The old wooden panel squealed and a crack opened
in the middle beneath my knuckles. I pulled my arm back and punched again and
again, widening a hole in the rotten wood with every blow, but I didn't feel
any better. A steady stream of angry rumbles coming up from my chest was the
background noise to my thoughts. Why couldn't the letter have said anything?
Why did I have it at all if it was just scribbles? Was someone just toying with
me, playing a cruel joke? It wasn't fair!
The
steady white noise of my own growling and the sound of splintering wood were
interrupted by a sudden, low creaking noise. I halted my assault on the wall in
surprise; it was <i>loud</i>,
and very close. A jolt of pain in my upper jaw drew my attention, and made me
realize the creaking, popping, grinding sound was inside my own mouth. The
noise grew louder and the pain grew worse. I pressed my hand to my mouth,
groaning, and I felt an eye-watering twist in my canine teeth. My low groan
turned into a high-pitched whine. It felt like my teeth were trying to shove
out of my skull. I pressed my hand against my mouth harder, hoping, wishing, I
could keep them still.
With a
sickening crack and a jab of agony that made my guts shrivel, my lower jaw was
forced to open several inches by huge things in my mouth that hadn't been there
a second ago. I felt them pushing against my hand, and cautiously peeled my
lips back. I touched the smooth protrusions, and discovered that they were my teeth. Twin bone blades,
shoving rudely out of my mouth where my obedient carnassials should've been.
It took
real strength, I think, not to get even further agitated. Despite being
disoriented, confused, with no memory, a body that makes no sense, a letter not
written in writing, and teeth that turn into weapons at random ... I refused to
panic. Holding myself still with all my might, I took quick, shallow breaths,
trembling with the effort. My tail was twitching in between my legs, my wings
flicking slightly open and pulling back in rapidly; small symptoms of shock
that might worsen any second if I couldn't make myself just breathe ...
I had
to use the full strength of my diaphragm to halt its anxious contractions, and
then give one long pull, inhaling all the way. I held it, held it tightly in my
chest until my nervous spasms ceased, until my tail relaxed and swung out into
its natural place, swaying comfortably from my lower back, then let out a great
groan of air.
The
tusks shifted uncertainly, giving little twists and twinges, before slipping
upward back into the flesh of my mouth. It was much less painful for them to
nestle in back where they belonged, and I sighed, relieved. Not just relieved
that I could comfortably close my mouth again, but also that I had done that. I'd taken control of
myself and made my teeth small again. It was the first time in my memory of one
hour that strange things like shape-shifting fangs hadn't jerked me around,
that I'd refused to be moved by something. In this strangely proud mood, I
approached the letter again, ready to take a level-headed crack at it.
The
runes on the page didn't look any different, but they somehow felt different. I
could imagine that they meant something, that someone had written them with
purpose and ideas. I blinked, and turned my head a little, not looking at the
whole page this time, but rather running my gaze over each line, word by word.
That felt better, more like the correct thing to do. And as I reached the end
of the page and returned to the top to look it over again, suddenly it clicked. The scribbles on the
page now meant something; I recognized a few letters. If I concentrated, I
found I could just barely remember a few words: plan, meant scheme or schedule
or a pre-determined set of actions in particular sequence meant to achieve a
goal; all, everything, everyone, every step - of the plan, perhaps.
There
was a sentence now, at the beginning of the letter: If all has gone according to plan, you are
confused.
I
grunted, dismayed; this was not off to a good start. A few more minutes'
careful study yielded the next sentence. You hopefully do not remember anything at all; it is my understanding
that it should work this way.
There
was something about the wording that seemed wrong to me; imagining these words
spoken aloud, they seemed stilted and unnatural. I could only imagine that the
writer hadn't been feeling himself. It became easier to read the longer I did,
and I managed to figure out the rest of the letter from there relatively
quickly.
I'm uncertain if you will even be
able to read this letter, to be honest with you. Unfortunately, that is what I
cannot be: honest. You must not know what, or especially who, you are, and I
will not tell you. All I can say is that you should keep it this way, if you
know what's good for you, and never seek out clues of
your past, or anyone who might have known you. Even if you feel you have to
know or you will go mad, choose madness, I implore you, or all of what I have
done will be for naught.
I have chosen this path, and for our sakes,
I hope you do not undo my choice.
- Your
past self
"You ...
selfish motherfucker." I said, the letter blurring as my hands shook. I
clenched my fists and ripped the delicate paper fitfully, over and over until
it was practically powder in the hay, and whirled back to the hole in the wall
instead. No matter how much energy I put into my attacks, rotten wood breaks
and splinters apart too easily, not allowing any satisfaction in the act of
destruction. I couldn't believe what I'd read, or rather, what hadn't been in
the letter to read. Was I really meant to know nothing at all of who I was?
There'd been nothing but a vague warning. Surely it couldn't have hurt to tell
me more than that; was my very name
some sort of taboo?
Fed up
with punching and clawing wood apart, I stood shuddering with frustration,
splinters pricking my palms and lodged in my fur, which was all messed up again
since my earlier brushing. I felt so disappointed, I was no closer now that
before to understanding anything. I shambled out of the barn, under the deep,
dark blue sky, crystal-clear and quite beautiful now that the storm had passed.
The
chaos and confusion was over in the atmosphere, but there was no end in sight
in my mind. Unsure of what I was doing, I dug in my stout front claws and began
to haul myself up the outside wall of the barn, leaving deep furrows behind me
from my equally strong hind paws. The wood creaked and shook to bear my weight;
given my excessive venting against the barn, when it was barely standing to
begin with, I wouldn't have been surprised if the entire thing collapsed under
my weight alone.
I kept
climbing despite that, until I was perched on the highest point of the roof,
with nowhere further to go. I lay down with my head on my forepaws, and shut my
eyes. The cloying cold was still there, stiffening my muscles despite my
exertion. I didn't know who I'd been before, but he must've been a real
jackass, wiping my memory and leaving me in the middle nowhere with no
direction. He hadn't spared a single thought for how I'd feel: like all there
was in the world was this barn, this frozen, flat stretch of land, and a
pathetic freak with no place in it who had no home.
I
highly doubted I would ever open my eyes now.
But
then, the wind shifted, and with my next breath, I smelled something that
changed my mind in a moment. I raised my head and gave a proper sniff. It was
faint, barely there, and it faded away completely if I turned my head the wrong
way. I couldn't tell exactly what it might be, or even anything to compare it
to (the only scents I knew were dirt and wood, and this was very different),
but I knew that I wanted it. In my mind's eye, the new scent glowed invitingly,
and I knew it promised something delicious, something to seek out.
It gave
me direction. It wasn't much, but in an empty field to a confused beast, it was
direction enough.
The
wind slackened, and the scent vanished. Wherever it came from, the source must
be very far away to be so faint. I turned from one side to the other, wishing
the wind would pick up again; all I needed was a few seconds, and maybe I could
tell which direction it was coming from.
A
sudden gust, and I whirled to face it. This was the right direction; even though it looked the
exact same as every other view away from the farmhouse, the faint glow in my
nostrils came stronger here than any other. This was my path.
I
extended my wings, hoping, pleading to myself, that my huge, muscular body
could be supported by these, and flung myself off the roof.
The
first flex of my wings was painfully slow and difficult; I felt cumbersome, the
least aerodynamic thing on wings. Beating against the dead air and the constant
downward pull was work, and it had me panting within minutes. My wing muscles
shivered constantly at the strain. This didn't feel like flying; it felt more
like dragging myself through the air.
I
forced myself to keep flapping. The glowing scent, though blown away now from
the motion of my wings, was worth the effort. With great, billowing sweeps, the
wind from my strokes ruffling my fur, I pushed ever forward.

 

Source: https://sofurry.com/view/503630