Rouge had known Shadow a long time, but when she heard about him attacking Sonic with no provocation outside of Apotos one night, she was scared. She heard that Sonic had been put into a coma that lasted for about a week, and that Shadow had been locked away in an insane asylum. Rouge thought that it might have been a little harsh, but when she went to visit Shadow, she happened to witness quite a fit from him. She just happened to mention Sonic's name and Shadow was all over her: "Sonic? Did you see him? Is he alive? Please tell me he's alive! Oh God, he's dead, isn't he? Where did they take him?"
And then the orderlies carted him off to a back room where Rouge didn't know nor care what they did with him.
Now that Shadow was out of the cage, she couldn't know what he was up to, though his file stated that he had frequented a particular webpage that regularly updated with "Sonic Sightings," which pretty much followed along the lines of "Spagonia- Ran through headed West," and so on and so forth. Recently, the most often Sighting description was "Nexus City- Ran through headed East."
The only things East of Nexus City were the Westwood Wildlife Sanctuary, Redwoods National Park and Redwood Park City. When Shadow was seen getting on a tour bus headed toward Redwood Park, Rouge was assigned to warn Sonic of the danger.
Shadow might just be out to finish the job.
Rouge explained all this to Sonic, who sat in awe, taking it all in. Shadow? Out to kill him? Only moments ago, Sonic remembered hearing Shadow's voice and recognizing how much it sounded like the woman he'd walked home with that night; the waitress-who-might-have-been-promoted-to-supervisor.
'Some-odd years ago, I beat up this guy. Was an accident; put him in a coma…'
Their stories seemed to match up, too… Wait, why was he remembering her drunken slur in perfect English?
Rouge cleared her throat, breaking Sonic out of his spaced-out stare at the bedcovers.
"So, I was only told to give you the heads up, so if you see Shadow, do what you do best, alright?"
"Wait!" Sonic called as she stood up, putting her chair away, "You don't have the whole story!"
Rouge pulled her chair back, giving Sonic a half glare.
"How long's this going to take, Sonic? I've got other things to do today."
She actually didn't, but hey, they were only paying her per mission, not per hour. Sonic seemed to be in a rush to get his thoughts together.
"Shadow didn't attack me, I was just running by and got in the way of something he was doing; he just- kinda- accidentally knocked the snot outta me. And just the other night, Shadow and I ran into each other, and I didn't know it was him, and I guess he didn't know it was me because we started talking like we didn't know each other, but that was because I can't see in the dark very well and he was kind of- well- I guess maybe he can't see in the dark either- I mean, he said he thought it was an accident, too, and he felt guilty about it and that he'd been… um. Looking for me? I mean, I guess he didn't know it was me, otherwise he wouldn't have-"
"But what if he did know it was you, Sonic?" Rouge had put up with this whole story, but the ultimate lifeform? Mr. Stealth? Unable to see in the dark? Not likely.
"Do you think Shadow planned to tell you that story? Maybe he wants you to be able to put up a fight, did you ever think of that?"
"I don't know what Shadow was thinking then. He was drunk at the time."
Rouge gave Sonic a look.
"He was drunk at the time. Really."
"Seriously, like once a week he goes out on the town! Just- hangin' out I guess. Havin' some beer with the guys."
Before Rouge could glare at Sonic some more, a doctor entered the room. She gave Sonic a visual once-over.
"Sonic, if you can walk to the door, you're free to go. I don't know what all the fuss was about anyways; your head's as hard as a rock!" The doctor laughed at her joke and turned to Rouge.
"Visiting Time's wrapping up, by the way. Might want to- y'know."
Rouge nodded and the two turned back to Sonic-
"SWEET FREEDOM!"
-who was actually already out the door, up the hall, down the stairs and about to crash into Shadow who was filling out paperwork at the reception desk.
Shadow frowned. Just for getting her shoulder dislocated, she had to fill out about fifty pages of release forms and waivers and bills and…well, you get the picture. She leaned forward a bit to make sure her emptying pen was actually putting her signature on the page when something akin to a train hit her, smacking her head into the desk and throwing her into a couple of nearby chairs. Her eyes watered from the shock and pain as an oddly familiar hedgehog turned to her and helped her up.
"Oh, man! Are you okay?"
"Fiddy pages …in lyblu ink."
And Shadow passed out for the second time that day.