Maria's POV

Scream...

I wanted to scream at the thought of how this happened.

I stood there and stared, completely shocked at how Shadow was treated this way and no one even knew... unless everyone was in on it...

"Sh-Shadow?" I whispered with obvious pain in my voice.

I see him tense up before he slowly turned his head over towards me. I then saw all the pain in his ruby red eyes... I felt a tear go down my cheek and I ran over to Shadow, dropping the keys in the doorway. I went over to him, sat down, and put him in my lap, not bothering that he only had underwear on, exposing his body. I held him in a hug and felt my stomach get wet. I pulled away and looked down to see a reopened wound going down his stomach.

I gasp and move my hand to it for a better look but instantly stilled and looked up when I heard Shadow whimper. I saw his face contorted into a look of pain and tears fell from his eyes. I then noticed the metal muzzle over his mouth and reached behind his head to take it off.

I pressed a few buttons in hopes of one of them unlocking the muzzle. I pressed one last button and the thing fell off. Shadow instantly gave a yelp of pain once it was off and away from his mouth. I began to panic more when I heard him. I dropped the muzzle on the floor and held Shadows head in my hands, brining our foreheads together. Trying to get him to look at me.

Shadow only hunched over and carefully held his stomach with one hand while the other wrapped around me with a death-like grip. By this time Shadow had tears flowing out his eyes like rivers while I had small streams. I held Shadow close, still trying to process how this happened. I then remembered what grandpa had said the day when Shadow had come down to the labs...

'I put him in the hands of my most trusted scientists,' his voice echoed in my head.

Those scientists are the ones that did this to Shadow... My eyes widen at the realization, and my blood boiled when I thought at how they would tell grandpa that he was still resting. Or was grandpa in on this too?

More tears flowed down my face and I held Shadow closer to me...

Shadow POV

The pain was unbearable...

It felt like I would pass out any moment from it. I held onto Maria with a death grip while trying to ease the pain from my reopened wound on my stomach. Although Maria caused it to reopen, in still glad she's here. I had thought I would never see her again... I didn't even think she was the one who came to my cell...

I cried softly into Maria's neck and tried not to scream bloody murder from all this pain that coursed through my veins. Maria hugged me tighter but not tight enough to cause more damage or pain. Right now I'm pretty sure neither of us know what to do in this situation. So we just sat there in my dark cell, my soft whimpers being the only sound.

That is... until we heard the lab doors open... My breath hitched and I began to panic. Maria hugged me tighter and I heard a growl-like groan come from her throat. I looked up to her to see that her head was pointing at the doorway and a mixture of anger, annoyance, pain, and pure hatred written on her facial features.

I heard running footsteps come to the door of my cell before they came to a sudden stop. I peeked my head out from behind Maria to see the very scientist that did all this to me... Mr. Claine....