FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

The door to the office opened slowly. I could have felt the cold shivers up my spine when I was watching. Rick was the first to try and pass on in. However, the game would softly chime as the image on the screen flashed forward. When we took a look up, we noticed the computer on the office desk rested in wait.

Annie was the last to enter in before closing the door behind us. She checked the knob for a moment before making sure the door was locked when we entered. I wasn't sure what she was thinking when she did that. Though she was good enough to explain it.

"Don't give me that look." She muttered. "I'm just making sure no one thinks someone picked the locks in case they patrol by."

That was definitely a relief at least. But getting out without making a sound felt harder than it was getting in. I checked the game again on the game gear to notice how the room looked. I didn't like what I saw.

The room depicted in the game felt like a dungeon in pixel form. The floor was gray and flat with granite detail while the background had a cavernous imagery going on with it. Parts of the room depicted had torch lights illuminating the chamber. I didn't like the feeling it gave me when I looked onto it.

The Amy and Ray sprites had their own idle animations based on it. Ray was more wide eyed with surprise while Amy was tapping her foot in impatience. I could already hear Annie's foot feeling ready to do the same behind me. So that just meant we had to get in and out quick. I preferred that personally.

"Over there." the game would respond. Cole was really earnest to get this over with too. I couldn't blame him. I wanted to get through this as much as he did. "Just hold me up to the computer. I can take it from here."

Luckily, we already knew this thing can handle wireless in a sense. Considering the TV trick Cole pulled, I could imagine that's what he was going to do. We took the time to walk over to the computer. Rick, on the other hand, simply landed on the desk chair and leaned back grinning.

"Never thought I'd be head of the police so soon~" He coyly spoke. Annie had to yank him off the chair before I sat myself down with the game in hand. Annie turned the computer on for me while the screen loaded. I couldn't imagine holding my breath while waiting on it.

However, it didn't take long for it to boot up and ask for a password. Soon as it did, I took notice of Espio vanishing from the game and reappearing on the screen. "Alright." Cole commented. "Let me take a bit to get in."

It took a while, but the noise of static and high pitch noise came echoing out of the computer as the screen shifts and statics. The screen suddenly glitches out before shifting back to a dark red tinted view with missing pixels on it. However, it also looked like the password request screen had been bypassed from the high frequency effect.

The sprite image of Espio was even on the screen. Its pixelated state moving towards one of the nearby folders available before examining deep into it. When it did, the screen changed to a pop up window of case files digitally recorded.

Meanwhile, Annie was skimming through a file cabinet at the side of the room for other files to read. She had to wipe the folders afterwords though when handling them. "Make sure you keep your hands clean or wear something over them. Can't leave anything behind."

"Right right." Rick would say dismissively. I had to make sure his blond locks weren't anywhere on the chair when he sat on it. Sometimes I wonder why he'd never keep his hair well kept. In the end, we managed to get a few files checked in the folders and the computer. But what irked me was this strange feeling of uneasiness I had going through my spine.

"I think this might be it." Cole spoke through the computer. One of the folders that was listed had the title 'Unsolved cases'. When opened, it showed the various images of each victim that was involved in the sonic.EXE cases. One of those files had to be Cole's.

Elsewise, Annie ended up mentioning something I worried about hearing. "Strange." She spoke. "you'd think there'd be a bag log of computer data files about those games. Or at least a folder involving pieces of those broken CD's."

"The one I found stuck in the last broken computer should be around there." He spoke. Though his tone seemed to trail off when he read more of the case files. As for me, I was left confused with what was presented. One of the case files was something that utterly worried me.

It involved a victim who was an average college student. Their first encounter was thinking someone left it as a prank at the time. However, one night, when he was staying at the police station in fear of it being a stalker, another officer was patrolling at the time when things became strange.

But part of the file was blacked out for some reason. All that was listed was them being a victim of a murderer who broke in to threaten them. That didn't feel right. I wasn't able to explain it but that didn't feel right.

"This isn't right." Cole interrupted my train of thought when he spoke about it. "The first murder was a report about a break in and a CD. It ended with the victim comatose and in medical attention until he gets out of his coma."

"Maybe the docs forgot to feed him or something?" Rick was always horrible with his sense of humor at the worst times. Though Annie's glare made him shut up then and there.

"No." Cole Corrected. "The game only puts the body into a comatose state. The body acts as an anchor to hold the spirit in the mortal plain so he can siphon from their spirits to make himself stronger. Toying with them is simply a plus."

"So you're saying is that if the victims 'died' then the spirits wouldn't be anchored?" Annie responded.

"Exactly." He replied. "A spirit has to have an anchor to the land of the living or else it ends up passing on into the afterlife. Some souls are anchored by their emotions of longing. Others are anchored by their memories and their unfinished business. What this game does is make a forceful anchor out of their body to keep them stuck in the realm of man."

Rick scratches his head oddly. "Couldn't he have made, like, an anchor with the CD's or something instead?"

"The anchor in this retrospect has to be compatible with the spirit in question. A generic object like a CD wouldn't cut it, since the CD's are used as a gateway rather than an anchor." Cole's explanation of it was holding solid so far. I, however, wasn't sure how to follow with it.

"The reason I would even know this was being a victim myself. But..." His voice trailed off again before his Espio sprite representation would shake its head to snap out of it. "That's not important right now. What's important is finding what we're here for."

The game blinked again before my attention drew to it. The sight of the computer in front of me was represented as yet another chaos emerald. But if an emerald was right here in front of us again then that only meant one thing.

"There." Cole's search ended with the more recent files that there were. One of which had the mention of another victim that made me turn slightly pale. 'Derek Green'.

"...There you are." He responded. I wasn't sure what he was talking about now, but I wasn't sure if I can handle what was going to happen from here. But I also knew what to do.

I held up the game gear to the computer screen where the charmy sprite in the game walked up to the emerald at the end of the cavernous chamber. He was shivering quite a bit when reaching towards it. Honestly, I was nerve wrecked thinking about what would become of this.

When the game glew, the computer responded quite frantic to it! Espio on the computer screen reared back before the file involving Derek green vanished soon after. All three of us were left rather confused otherwise. But the sight of Charmy with another emerald was enough for me to just wanna leave.

"Okay we got what we came for!" I responded, getting up off the chair and walking around the desk. "We're out!"

"Not yet." Cole responded. "My file on the case prior isn't here."

I stopped in an instant, making me cringe as I facepalmed myself. "There was an emerald here and that's what we came for."

"Uhm no." Annie responded - her arms crossed. "We came here for Cole's evidence on the case. That includes the physical."

"Oh come on!" I hoarsely whispered at them."It isn't in the evidence locker and it isn't here!"

"Then doesn't that mean it isn't in the police station dude?" Rick responded. Again, saying the wrong thing and the right thing at the same time, it made me worry. Because if the case file isn't in this room, and it wasn't in the computer, then where could it be?

What got my mind out of the gutter in that moment was the game flashing again. When it did...it gave off that ominous low volume of music I did NOT want to hear!

The screen on the game in hand showed some shadowed figure making an approach down a brick and steel hallway towards an entrance. The figure looked like the silhouette of someone I did not want to run into a second time! When that was happening, we heard the knob on the door jiggle when an unlocking noise came from it.

Cole had to jolt back into the game again in that instant. The computer on the desk suddenly turned off on its own while Espio on the game grabbed the emerald. "Huddle up!" His text came up. Considering someone was out there, it was a relief the game wasn't making much noise!

The three of us huddle up together behind the desk, ducking down, and kept out of sight for the majority. When that happened, it felt like something got colder in the room for some reason.

The door opening revealed to be the chief of police entering in. He was a tall man, broad in shoulder, and dressed with a blue shirt and black denim pants. The gray of his hair was like a mane adorning his scalp. But the piercing look in his brown eyes was like seeing red when he came in.

But what was on the game was a different story entirely. It wasn't a badnik being depicted on the screen, but something more disturbed.

It looked like the sprite work of sonic himself, but the coloration was blacked out over the blue. The quills looked inverted and there were patterns of gray stripes on the sprite representation. But those eyes ... they were definitely that games eyes with black and red dots. But this wasn't sonic.

It was shadow.

I had to grab Rick's mouth tight along with Annie. We didn't want him making a snarky comment at a time like this! Especially since the sprite of the twisted image of shadow came closer to the altar where the emerald once rested.

Instead of going to the altar, it made a detour towards the right. The chief ended up going to one of the file cabinets instead to rummage for a file or two. When he did, he pulled up some papers in one of the folders before closing the file cabinet. His hand went to the phone at his side, dialing, and calling someone.

"Hello?" he responded. "I have the files involving Derek Green and Cole Wilson." He spoke.

The game was at least kind enough to show the writing of the conversation. But I was able to know these details from being stupid enough to peek over when he wasn't looking. I would duck back after getting enough visual understanding, only to stare at the screen when it showed noiseless text of the reception on the other end.

"Good." Read the text. "Make sure those papers are properly disposed of. They should have been at the very start."

"My apologies." The chief responded. "I didn't want any suspicion about me to begin with so I had to leave them alone until later."

"Well make sure that they're gone. But don't feel afraid to make a few changes to Cole's files."

"Right." He said. "...Cole Wilson...Died in action."