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Description
TK's eyes fluttered open lead-heavy and slow, head feeling as if it were stuffed with wet cotton. The world around her had an odd greenish haze over it, and a strange, droning hum filled her ears - both, effects of whatever had been used to knock her out, she reasoned. With that conclusion came remembrance, and with that came a flash of drug-dulled, resigned anger.

"Damn bounty-hunter..." the muzzy tiger-girl muttered...or at least she tried to. But the words, which would have been a groggy mumble even under other circumstances, instead came out a muffled, garbled grunt. And that was when she discovered the strange metal muzzle which had been affixed over her face, holding her jaw shut and stifling her voice all-too effectively.

Reflexively, she started to reach up to pull the thing away...and received her second shock. And her second major blast of information through the hazy shroud which was only slowly unraveling from her brain. As she tried to move, TK felt...something...holding her in place. Not bonds of rope of leather; no bands, straps, or strands...but something all the same. A weird pressure seemed to flow all around her body, pressing against her fur and holding her in place - but there was something decidedly "wrong" about the sensation, over and above its mere presence. As if there wasn't anything physically there to do the holding. She tried again, pushing outward with one arm, and felt that same back-pressure, the same sense of "weight" all around her...which intensified against the straining limb, seemingly in proportion to the strength she applied against it. The harder she pushed, the harder the strange "force" seemed to push back. Even when she was standing completely "relaxed" - a generous term for the angry, alarmed tension which riveted the captive tiger-heroine's body at that moment - the field was firm enough to hold her upright, arms trapped at her sides and legs pinned tightly together. Another muffled growl rolled out from behind the muzzle-thing, while TK's tail strained against the hold of the weird "tractor field", to lash in fury.

Awareness continued to trickle down over TK's brain, picking up speed as adrenaline and fury helped to clear the drug from her system. Slowly, more remembrance filtered in, riding the wake of her returning consciousness. Dimly, she could recall being taken down by that bounty hunter - a defeat that stung her pride, even through the fog which filled her head. After that, memories became more hazy and fragmentary; maybe being in a run-down building or old warehouse...Morgus being there...the "delivery" being completed...some sort of vehicle ride, maybe in a van...and now here...

Wherever "here" was.

TK tried to force herself to wake faster, to figure that latter part out, because however she'd gotten wherever she was...that was in the past. Nothing to be done for it now. It was the present moment that mattered. Ranking not far behind it, of course, the future; between what the hunter had said and Morgus' presence, TK knew that Doctor Sadarus was behind all of this...and that could only mean trouble with a capital "T" for her. If he wasn't here now, that was certainly a reprieve which wouldn't last long. She had to take advantage of it while she could and get away.

Of course, as was most often the case, that was a resolution much easier made than carried out. Momentarily, she wondered how they had gotten her into this thing. Before the far more important question asserted itself: How was she going to get herself out?

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To Part 2

Description
TK's eyes fluttered open lead-heavy and slow, head feeling as if it were stuffed with wet cotton. The world around her had an odd greenish haze over it, and a strange, droning hum filled her ears - both, effects of whatever had been used to knock her out, she reasoned. With that conclusion came remembrance, and with that came a flash of drug-dulled, resigned anger.

"Damn bounty-hunter..." the muzzy tiger-girl muttered...or at least she tried to. But the words, which would have been a groggy mumble even under other circumstances, instead came out a muffled, garbled grunt. And that was when she discovered the strange metal muzzle which had been affixed over her face, holding her jaw shut and stifling her voice all-too effectively.

Reflexively, she started to reach up to pull the thing away...and received her second shock. And her second major blast of information through the hazy shroud which was only slowly unraveling from her brain. As she tried to move, TK felt...something...holding her in place. Not bonds of rope of leather; no bands, straps, or strands...but something all the same. A weird pressure seemed to flow all around her body, pressing against her fur and holding her in place - but there was something decidedly "wrong" about the sensation, over and above its mere presence. As if there wasn't anything physically there to do the holding. She tried again, pushing outward with one arm, and felt that same back-pressure, the same sense of "weight" all around her...which intensified against the straining limb, seemingly in proportion to the strength she applied against it. The harder she pushed, the harder the strange "force" seemed to push back. Even when she was standing completely "relaxed" - a generous term for the angry, alarmed tension which riveted the captive tiger-heroine's body at that moment - the field was firm enough to hold her upright, arms trapped at her sides and legs pinned tightly together. Another muffled growl rolled out from behind the muzzle-thing, while TK's tail strained against the hold of the weird "tractor field", to lash in fury.

Awareness continued to trickle down over TK's brain, picking up speed as adrenaline and fury helped to clear the drug from her system. Slowly, more remembrance filtered in, riding the wake of her returning consciousness. Dimly, she could recall being taken down by that bounty hunter - a defeat that stung her pride, even through the fog which filled her head. After that, memories became more hazy and fragmentary; maybe being in a run-down building or old warehouse...Morgus being there...the "delivery" being completed...some sort of vehicle ride, maybe in a van...and now here...

Wherever "here" was.

TK tried to force herself to wake faster, to figure that latter part out, because however she'd gotten wherever she was...that was in the past. Nothing to be done for it now. It was the present moment that mattered. Ranking not far behind it, of course, the future; between what the hunter had said and Morgus' presence, TK knew that Doctor Sadarus was behind all of this...and that could only mean trouble with a capital "T" for her. If he wasn't here now, that was certainly a reprieve which wouldn't last long. She had to take advantage of it while she could and get away.

Of course, as was most often the case, that was a resolution much easier made than carried out. Momentarily, she wondered how they had gotten her into this thing. Before the far more important question asserted itself: How was she going to get herself out?

---------------------------
To Part 2