Chapter Fifteen: Fear the Dark
"How can you expect me to believe what you've just said?"
At this point, Tails was back on the island, being interrogated by Shadow. The helicopter, miraculously, had managed to take flight again despite being pretty badly damaged, but since Tails' plane had sunk, he really didn't have that much he could do at the time other than keep order back on the island. And Shadow's questioning meant that he couldn't even do that right now.
"What was I supposed to say- I just started doing freaky death-defying stunts for the heck of it? Does that sound like me, at all?"
"I wouldn't be too surprised," Shadow countered. "You do love to go on and on about science this and science that and speak in technobabble no sane being could understand, so having spread that trait to your flying skills wouldn't be out of the realm of possibility."
Knuckles had come out to join the party, having taken about forty or so bandages from the medical kit Sonic always kept in his hut to cover up the lines of burnt, inflamed flesh on his back. "You're saying that whatever this thing is made you hallucinate? How can you prove it?"
"I can't," Tails said. "What, do you think I can just send you through what I just experienced with a snap of my fingers? Why can't you just believe what I'm saying?"
"Because it doesn't make sense," Shadow said.
"The last twelve hours haven't made sense either. Get used to it," Tails shot back.
Before it could dissolve into a full-blown argument, they all picked up the sound of helicopter blades. In seemingly no time at all, the helicopter was hovering above the island once more, before settling on the ground this time with a gentle thud. To just about everybody, that was an unexpected development.
Rouge called out, "Guys, you're not supposed to land! You have to stay in the air at all times so Sonic has a harder time performing homing attacks on the helicopter!"
"We know," one of the pilots responded. "We're really sorry about this-" they then tried and failed to conceal a massive yawn- "but we need to clock out for a few hours. We've been awake for twenty-two hours and counting, and we've drank so much coffee to get to this point that it isn't doing anything anymore."
Shadow managed to choke out an "I understand." As soon as they heard those words, both pilots staggered out of the helicopter, made it about ten feet further, and then collapsed on the grass, asleep before their heads hit the ground.
Most of the villagers were not pleased, considering they'd only made two runs to the mainland out of the eight they needed and it was barely past sunset. However, the few who somehow remained complacent- mostly those so old they were beyond caring or so young they didn't quite grasp what was going on- took the opportunity to get some rest of their own, retiring to their huts and cottages.
As for everyone else, resentment looked ready to boil over. Resentment towards the eighty or so lucky ones that escaped the nightmare, towards the pilots for not being helpful, towards anyone and everyone. Sure, most of these villagers were usually polite, but for just about everybody, their lives came first and good manners a very pitiful second.
Sensing that everyone was in a foul mood, everyone knew they had to do something to prevent the crowd from erupting into a full-scale riot. Thus, Tails yelled at the crowd, "I know, I know. You're all probably thinking, 'Why the heck are the pilots asleep and not helping us get out of here?' But considering that Shadow and Rouge are the ones who brought them here, I think that they'll be best suited to answer this question!"
Rouge took over from there. "They were the only two people our employer could spare. Everyone else is off transporting a weapon of mass destruction. They were nearing the end of a sixteen-hour shift when we got them, and the only reason they're even here is that they're getting paid some serious overtime for this. They're not robots, they need sleep too. Do you want them falling asleep while you're in the air, as opposed to now?"
The murmurs of discontent didn't disappear, but they calmed down somewhat, which was all they really needed. Rouge finished off by saying, "Sorry for this, but they'll need a few hours at best. Please try to be patient."
Everyone in the crowd seemed to turn to the person next to them, trying to find some comfort in them. However, no one in particular was yelling wild accusations at them, trying to attack them, or sobbing hysterically (from what the five of them could see, anyway) which was a big plus.
Nevertheless, Rouge tried to see if there was something they could do to help. "Tails, can you fly a helicopter?"
Tails shook his head. "If there are manuals on board, I can probably figure out how without too much trouble, but even then it'll take a few hours, and I need to sleep too, you know."
"I'll check if there's anything," Rouge said. Then, she turned around to see Metal Sonic, who had just come out of the woods (presumably hunting for Sonic again). Even when Tails said, "Don't worry, he's working for us now," it didn't quell her fears completely.
"I may possess the capabilities to send villagers to the mainland one at a time," Metal Sonic stated in his flat voice. "Should I inform them about this possibility?"
"That doesn't seem like a very good idea," Tails countered. "Saying that you might be able to do it isn't good enough. If you take the first villager and suddenly find out that you can't make it, both of you die. Hold on, what do robots call dying?"
"Just 'dying', Tails the Fox," Metal Sonic said.
"Okay then," Rouge said. "Now, if we can't do anything while the pilots are passed out, how about we try to get a few hours of sleep ourselves? We can wrap this up in the morning."
Sticks was not pleased with that solution. "What happens if this thing attacks at night? We'll all be asleep, so there won't be a chance any of us can stop it, and then we're all dead."
"We'll sleep in shifts. I've had to do that for a few missions," Shadow said. "Including Metal Sonic, there's six of us. I'm not counting Amy because, unfortunately, she won't be of much use in a fight, so she should just sleep and try to recover. Two of us watch for Sonic at a time, the rest of us sleep. Two hours each shift means everyone will get four good hours of sleep, barring us being attacked. Let's assign shifts quickly so we can figure out who's staying awake."
Tails was immediately assigned to the last shift, as he looked so exhausted he was about to fall over. Rouge volunteered to stick with him so that there would be someone experienced in hand-to-hand combat on duty at all times. Metal Sonic quickly took the first shift, as did Knuckles, which left Shadow and Sticks with the middle shift.
However, there was one question to still be addressed, which Sticks quickly brought up. "How are we supposed to keep an eye on the villagers?"
"We walk in circles around the village while it's our shift," Rouge explained. "Based on how big the village is, I'm guessing that one lap should take about twenty minutes if we walk fast." This was quickly followed by, "Should we tell the villagers to go home for now, lock the doors, and try to get some sleep of their own?"
"Makes sense," Tails said. "Can you make this announcement as well?"
"Yes, I can," Rouge replied.
Without a word, she strode purposefully over to the large cluster of villagers gathered around the plaza, hoping that this wouldn't incite a mass riot.
Somehow, no more blood was spilled following that bombshell.
A few curses were sent her way, and one villager tried to make a mad dash for the helicopter like he would magically know how to fly the thing, but nobody threw any punches, an action for which Rouge was glad. She was trained in hand-to-hand combat in case it came to blows, but these weren't villains hellbent on taking over the world- they were just ordinary, terrified people who didn't want to die. Even if she had to restrain one, it would have felt wrong.
Sonic's hut was still a wreck, and the respective places the others lived were too far away for going back to them to make any sense. Therefore, Shadow dragged out a couple of sleeping bags he found inside the now-grounded helicopter.
As soon as they were set up, Tails slipped inside one and was asleep before his head hit the ground. Sticks quickly followed suit. Metal Sonic and Knuckles strode off for their shift, one with a slight limp and the other covered with a mosaic of bandages.
Rouge nodded off as well after a few minutes, leaving only Shadow awake. He briefly contemplated just pulling an all-nighter and going to sleep when he was actually tired, but the last thing he needed was for a sudden wave of exhaustion to hit him halfway through his shift.
Thus, his thoughts soon meshed into a hazy blur, and everything seemed to shut down as his eyes closed, leaving this world behind.
It was no surprise that Metal Sonic and Knuckles were hoping for an uneventful shift.
The villagers had mostly heeded the advice Rouge had given them, disappearing inside their homes. However, the occasional straggler still paced around the village. One actually walked side by side with Knuckles for a few minutes before peeling off into a badly-lit alley and vanishing from sight again.
A sliver of the moon lit their way somewhat, but the walk around the village was shadowy, and whenever a cloud floated in front of it everything plunged into blackness. Luckily enough, the paths they followed were relatively free of things to trip over, so they managed to make it most of the way around their first lap without falling over.
Ironically, when one of them finally did, it wasn't because of something on the ground. It was caused by a piercing beep shattering the relative silence.
Knuckles suddenly face-planted. Metal Sonic stopped to pull him back up. While Knuckles did get back on his feet without a problem, it put him in prime position to be lambasted by Eggman's voice.
"Hey! To whoever's listening, I've finished setting up a defense network. Meaning, as soon as I can find something that will get me there, I'll head to Bygone Island with some stuff that can help you fight Sonic. Chances are, I'll be there in less than an hour. That is all. Farewell!"
The communicator then shut off. No words were needed to figure out what any of that meant, so Metal Sonic and Knuckles didn't waste time talking about it, instead just finishing up their first lap.
That was when things started to deviate from "uneventful."
They were in sight of the rest of their allies (minus Amy, who had been recovering in Sonic's cottage for the past six hours or so) when they noticed something off. Sure, their forms were all prone, lying in various poses of slumber, just as they had expected. However, the closer they looked, the more… wrong it seemed. They were twitching quite a bit, far more so than when they usually slept, and even stranger, as Knuckles and Metal Sonic approached them, he noticed that they were all moaning in what sounded like pain, sometimes spitting out garbled words but most of the time just a long, continuous noise.
"Okay," Knuckles said once he got a good look at them. "What the heck is going on?"
Suddenly, they all began to shake violently, letting loose the occasional scream and clutching themselves. Drool foamed out of their mouths, their eyes clenched shut as tightly as possible, and their movements became so prominent they began to hit each other in the process.
Knuckles' worries grew worse by the second. "What the- how do we stop this?"
"We wake them up, Knuckles the Echidna," Metal Sonic stated. "The others all appear to be in a state of Rapid Eye Movement sleep, meaning that they are likely experiencing an event known as a dream. However, they appear to not be very pleasant ones."
Rouge rolled over in her sleep, giving Knuckles a good look at her face. It was frozen in an expression of sheer horror, teeth clenched.
Knuckles' chest seized up. His body went rigid for a second. But once he could function again, he asked the question that was probably being thought about by Metal Sonic as well.
"What the heck is going on in their heads?"
Review Zone, Act XIV:
-Linz2: Thanks, once again, for leaving a review! The helicopter's still working, but based on this chapter, it'll be a while before it can get used again.