Very big THANKS to Shippo's Ramen for providing me with a certain team's slogan. Without him/her, some of the humour in this chapter would have been lost. THANK YOU SHIPPO!

Disclaimer: I do not own Pokémon and/or Sonic related people/places.

Chapter 6

One Down…How Many More?

Sonic had slowed down to a jog when Hoothoot had begun to shed its feathers and was now following the bird's lead. He didn't mind, since it seemed to know where it was going.

"How much longer until we find my friends?" the hedgehog asked.

"Hoot," it said simply.

Sonic sighed, not bothering to try to decipher the creature's meanings. He knew by now that it wasn't going to work out for him, and that trying would only frustrate him. He didn't mind at first, but after meeting that girl and having a chance to talk to someone intelligent enough to talk back, he wished the owl could say something besides "Hoot hoot".

"Hoot, hoo hoot hoot."

There it goes again.

Sonic looked up at it to find it stopped in mid-air and turned to look at him. He was about to ask what was wrong, when he heard something.

"I TOLD YOU TO BACK OFF!" yelled an unmistakable familiar voice.

Sonic smiled. Knuckles.

"AND YOU!" he shouted again, obviously directed at someone or something else. "CALL OFF YOUR STUPID PET BEFORE I RIP IT APART!"

Sonic grabbed Hoothoot and took off in the direction of the shouting and they were there in a matter of milliseconds, standing at the edge of a field in which the red echidna Knuckles and a purple-haired boy stood. Knuckles was redder than ever, swatting at bright pink floating clown-looking thing that was miming his every move while the human stood coolly a short distance away. Also in the field was a short orange-ish-brown beat-up-looking monkey with…fire on its butt?

Sonic blinked and rubbed his eyes, but the fire was still there. However, the monkey didn't seem to notice or care, as though it were completely natural for flames to be licking at its rear.

"Use Flamewheel, Chimchar," the purple-haired human said to the monkey.

"I swear, if you try it—" the crimson echidna warned, but the human ignored.

"Now, Chimchar," he ordered.

Sonic watched the monkey give Knuckles an apologetic look before jumping into and spinning in the air, creating a wheel of fire with its butt. To his horror, the ring of flame began a speedy roll towards his red buddy, leaving a trail of smouldering grass in its wake. Knuckles started to dodge, but Sonic knew he was too slow to get out of the way in time. So the hedgehog decided to step in.

Leaving the owl under the cover of the trees, Sonic sprang forward, too fast for the wind to whistle in his ears, and tackled his friend. The blue blur collided with Knuckles with enough force to send them both flying a safe fifteen feet out of the way. Both were back on their feet in a moment; Knuckles angry, Sonic his usual care-free self.

"Heya, Knux!" the hedgehog said casually. "You find some trouble?"

Knuckles blinked at him. "…Sonic? What are you doing here?" He looked over his cobalt friend critically, noticing the small swollen spots all over his body. He also noticed the smell. "What happened to you? And why do you stink so bad?" He plugged his nose, and the pink thing did the same.

Sonic shrugged. "Long story. It involved giant hornets and a drooling mushroom. You get used to the smell. What about you? Who's your friend?"

"The pink thing that copies my every movement? That is NOT my friend. It's an annoyingly cute floating freak that only says 'mime', but never talks unless I do!"

Sure enough, all the while Knuckles was talking, the pink clown spoke in unison with him, saying, "Mime mime mime mime mime."

Knuckles was about to say something else, but he was didn't have the chance to because the purple-haired boy interrupted.

"So you're not the only one," he said to Knuckles with a cold voice. "Fine then, I'll just get two instead." He turned to his monkey again. "Chimchar, finish this with Scratch."

Sonic waited as the monkey ran towards him and Knuckles and spin-dashed it away with ease when it was close enough, being careful not to hurt it too bad. The animal seemed okay, but it didn't look like it would out up much of a fight for a little while, due to the strange black swirls that appeared in its eyes. Knuckles, however, had other things on his mind.

With the grace of an elephant, the echidna marched straight up to the purple haired boy, who still stood as though he were the most powerful being in the world (reminding Sonic a lot of a certain ebony hedgehog). Knuckles stopped two feet in front of the human, who looked down at him coolly.

"You know what?" Knuckles said angrily, then his voice turned to a shout. "I DON'T LIKE YOU!" With that, the infuriated anthromorph drew back his fist, then shot it out and connected with the human's nose, all the while the pink clown was following his every movement.

The boy was sent flying back a few feet from the impact and blood began pouring from his nose immediately. "You broke my nose!" he shouted angrily at Knuckles.

"I'll break more than that next time, punk!"

Sonic couldn't help but laugh. Even trapped on another world, Knuckles would always be Knuckles…maybe a little more violent, but still Knuckles.

His friend turned to face him. "What are you laughing at?" he demanded of Sonic.

"Just you, Knux," the cobalt animal replied, still laughing. "What say we blow this popsicle stand?"

The human on the ground stood back up, wiping the blood from his nose onto his blue sweater. "No you don't," he said, shooting Knuckles a death-glare. "Not until I catch at least one of you!"

Thus saying, he pulled a red and white ball from his pocket and pressed a button on the front, making it grow so that it filed his hand.

Again with those balls… Sonic thought. What do they mean…? "Hey Knuckles, watch it!" he shouted as the human threw the ball at his friend.

It bounced off of Knuckles' head, opened, and Sonic watched in horror as his red companion disappeared in a beam of red light into the ball. His mouth dropped open.

"…Knuckles?" he said worriedly as the human grinned with triumph.

"Your friend is mine, now," he started to say, "and you—"

He was cut off as the ball on the ground suddenly burst open and Knuckles re-materialized in the exact same spot, in the exact same position. The echidna looked around, wondering why it had suddenly gone black for a couple seconds before he could see everything again.

"No!" the boy shouted. "That should have worked!"

Knuckles turned to him, this time with a death-glare all his own. "Do you have a death-wish, punk?" he asked, his voice hard as steel. "I told you to LEAVE ME ALONE!"

"I'm a Pokémon Trainer!" the boy shouted back. "I don't listen to you; YOU listen to ME!"

Sonic and Knuckles exchanged confused glances. There's that word again…Pokémon… Sonic thought. I wonder what it means?

"Not today, I don't," Knuckles replied, decided whatever he meant by 'Pokémon Trainer' didn't matter.

"Hey, Chuckles," Sonic said.

Knuckles and his pink companion turned to look at him.

"Let's get out of here and find the others, kay?" He wanted to get his friend out of there before he caused any more physical damage to this human boy with purple hair.

Shooting one last glare at the human, Knuckles finally turned to his friend/rival and nodded. Sonic grinned flashed to the echidna's side, then grabbed his arm (when the clown realized what he was doing, it grabbed onto Knuckles' head) and took off again, once again leaving a confused human in his wake.

The two stopped under the cover of the trees, where Sonic and Hoothoot were reunited. "Hey buddy, told ya I'd be back," Sonic said to the owl with a smile, in a somewhat better mood now that he had found Knuckles. He turned to his friend. "Knux, this is my new bud Hoothoot. Hoothoot, this is Knuckles."

"Uhh… Hello," Knuckles said uncomfortably upon being introduced to a small round owl that seemingly only had one leg.

It smiled at him widely. "Hoot!" it said happily from the ground where it stood.

"Hoothoot helped me find you," Sonic informed his red companion.

"Its name is Hoothoot?" Knuckles asked, swatting absently at the pink thing that was still mimicking him.

He shrugged. "That's what Misty said it was. And that's all it says."

"Who's Misty?"

"Just a girl that almost killed me."

"Oh." Knuckles regarded the owl, and then the clown curiously. "What do you think these things are, anyways?"

"How am I supposed to know? I just call `em natives and run with it. They probably wonder about us even more than we do of them."

"Yeah…I guess you're right," Knuckles said, still looking troubled.

Sonic noticed this and frowned. "What's up, Knux?"

The echidna hesitated. "…Never mind. It's nothing," he said, obviously forcing a smile. He noticed that Sonic looked troubled, too. "What's your problem."

"…I'm worried."

"About what?"

"Shadow."

"Oh…" Knuckles had completely forgotten about Shadow, though how, he was unsure. Shadow was the reason they were in this unfamiliar territory in the first place. He was the one who had teleported them all there, seemingly accidentally. He was the one who had evidently fallen for one of Eggman's tricks. He was the whole cause behind what was happening to them all right now! But still…

Knuckles had to agree with Sonic. He was worried, too.

"Hoothoot," the little round owl interrupted his thoughts. The two anthromorphs looked down to see it standing between them both, looking up impatiently.

"Sorry Hoothoot," Sonic said with a smile. All signs of worry faded from his face, but Knuckles knew his friend better than that. "What's up, bud?"

"Hoot hoot!" it replied, jumping up and down while fluttering its wings.

"You know where some more of my friends are?"

"Hoot!" It launched itself into the air and hovered, waiting.

Sonic turned to Knuckles. "You up for this?"

"Are you kidding? The sooner we find everyone, the sooner we can find a way back to Mobius!" Knuckles replied. "I was ready two hours ago!"

"Which way we headin?" Sonic asked Hoothoot.

The owl gestured with its head northeast.

"It is a long ways?"

"Hoot," the bird replied, nodding.

Sonic smiled and turned to Knuckles. "You up for a run?"

Knuckles nodded. "If it means getting us out of this dimension and back to Mobius, count me in."

Sonic wasn't listening to Knuckles, though; he was too distracted by the floating pink clown that was still following his every movement and saying in sync with him, "Mime mime mime mimemime mime mime mimemimemime mime mime mime mime, mime mime miiiimmmeee mime."

"Soooonnniiiicccc," Knuckles said, waving his hand in front of his friend's face.

"Huh? Wha—?" Sonic asked, snapping back to reality. "Oh, sorry Knux. I wasn't listening."

The echidna sighed, muttering, "Could Tails have found me? Nooo, it had to be the hedgehog with the attention span of a toddler," before repeating his earlier statement.

"Great," Sonic said. "Grab your pet."

"It's not my pet," Knuckles said, trying to pull the clown off his face after it heard mention of leaving.

"And it's not my problem," Sonic replied as Hoothoot flew into his arms. "Ready?"

Before Knuckles could answer, the hedgehog took off, going northwest at two hundred miles per hour.

It took him a few seconds to realize he was going the wrong way.

It took another few seconds to realize he'd left Knuckles behind.

In yet another part of the world

"I'm hungry," the purple-blue haired adult complained from the corner of the hot-air balloon basket, holding his rumbling stomach weakly.

"I hear ya," agreed the beige cat with the golden oval on its forehead.

"Me three," added the woman with long red hair that curled at the end.

"Wobbuffet."

The four in the balloon basket inhaled and performed a collective sigh, each longing for the same thing: food.

"And I miss my little Mimey," James continued in a whine, sighing again and feeling very depressed.

"Well, maybe if ya hadn't yelled at `im, it'd still be around," the talking Meowth said.

"It'll come back. Stop complaining," Jessie ordered sharply, as was her nature.

James just sighed again.

Meowth stood from his corner opposite of James and peered over the side of the hot-air balloon. "Y'know, that little Mime Jr. is probably on its way back here now."

"Woooobbuffet," the blue blob agreed, joining Meowth's side.

"I can't believe our luck," Jessie said from the opposite side of the basket. "We've been chasing the twerp's Pikachu for years, but we can't seem to get a hold of it; whenever we come across a Legendary Pokémon, we always end up helping the same twerps get rid of the eviller people after them; we've been trying for years to please the Boss, but no matter what we do, we always end up messing everything up; we never have any food, even though we're always hungry; and now Mime Jr. has run away from you, James."

"Our lives are sugar cubes in a whirlpool," Meowth added.

"Why do we even bother, Jessie?" James asked. "I don't know about you, but I'm sick of this life. It's the same thing all the time: we follow the twerps; steal their Pokémon on occasion, only to have them stolen back right from under our noses; then Team Rocket goes blasting off again. Haven't you ever wondered if there's more to life than just Team Rocket? Why do we have to be the bad guy?"

She thought about this for a moment, then replied with, "Because somebody has to be. The spot of the good guy is filled by the twerps."

James wasn't satisfied. "But haven't you ever wanted to try something new?"

"Like what? We get our shot at being the hero whenever we meet up with a Legendary—"

"That's not what I mean," James interrupted. "I mean a different career, a different lifestyle. Haven't you ever wanted to settle down, Jessie? Haven't you wondered what it would be like to have kids of ou—your own, watching them grow up to become Pokémon Masters?"

"Or losers like us," Meowth stated, adding its two cents worth.

"Wobbuffet," the blue thing chimed in.

"…No, not really," Jessie confessed, turning to look at James for a moment before reverting her attention to the forest beyond the balloon.

There was a moment's awkward silence.

"…I've always wanted to be a ballerina," Meowth said…a little too openly. Jessie and James stared at him.

"Wobbuffet!"

"Wobbuffet wants to be an opera singer," the Pokémon translated.

James opened his mouth to say something, but was cut off when Jessie suddenly exclaimed, "Hey! Look at that!"

In a moment, Pokémon and people were crowded on Jessie's side of the balloon basket, causing it to tilt. Jessie was leaned over the side, pointing to something on the ground a ways ahead.

"What is it?" James asked, peering at the orange creature on the earth below.

"I think it's a Pokémon," Meowth said, squinting at the two-tailed animal. "But I don't recognize it."

"Do you think it's a new one?" Jessie asked.

James pulled out a Pokédex and pointed it in the creature's direction.

"…Species unidentifiable," the automated voice announced.

James closed the Pokédex and shoved it pack into his pocket, then noticed Jessie and Meowth staring at him. "What?"

"Since when d'ya got a Pokédex?" Meowth asked.

James shifted. "I…Uh…I've always had one…" he said sheepishly, knowing what was coming.

Meowth stared at him another moment before it exploded. "Ya had a Pokédex this whole time!?" it demanded. "What about me? Did ya not trust me? I was yer Pokédex! Why would ya even consider—?"

"Shut up, Meowth!" Jessie hissed, much to James' relief. "Look!"

Everyone did and saw the creature looking up at them. After a few seconds, it jumped into the air and began rotating its two tails like a propeller, somehow using them to fly.

"Incredible!" James declared as the creature began its route towards them. "Any ideas as to what it is?"

"I dunno," Meowth said, "but whatever Pokémon it is, I got an idea."

It and Jessie exchanged glances, and Jessie beamed. "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"Oh no…" James muttered, knowing exactly what she was thinking.

"Da Boss'll be so pleased wid us if we catch dat Pokémon for `im!"

"I can see it now!" Jessie exclaimed, stars lighting her eyes.

Then the fantasy began.

"I knew you three were worth keeping around," Meowth said in its best impersonation of the Boss.

"How would you like to be promoted to Vice-Presidents of Team Rocket?" Jessie continued in an impression that was somewhat worse than Meowth's.

The two crowded together in front of James, their eyes bright as their fantasy continued. "We'd love to!" they shouted in unison, beaming ridiculously.

"Only if Team Rocket doesn't go blasting off again," James said, rolling his eyes and turning back to the fox Pokémon, who was now halfway to the balloon, but still sixty feet away. Meowth and Jessie finally snapped back to reality and sprang into action.

"Target acquired!" Meowth announced.

Jessie turned to James with a smile. "Ready?" she asked.

"As if I have a choice," he replied dryly.

She turned back to Meowth. "Fire."

Tails had been wandering around for two hours straight; ever since he had landed on this unfamiliar territory. He was alone when he'd arrived. We must have all been separated and scattered across this world, he had thought upon arrival. Immediately, he'd begun his search for his friends. But so far, he hadn't found any sign of them, or any other intelligent life here.

That was when he saw it:

A giant cat-faced hot-air balloon was headed in his direction. Only intelligent life forms could build one, he knew, and therefore hope had flooded him. He was even happier when he saw that there were humans on board: a girl with long, dark red hair, and a man with purple hair. Both wore white outfits with a large red 'R' in the center of the shirt, and Tails wondered if they were some kind of rescue party. Not that it mattered; the only important thing was that he had found humans, who could in turn, possibly help him find his friends.

Tails did the only logical thing there was to do. Using his skilled tails, he began a flight towards the humans, a grin plastered on his face. He was like a little kid going to a candy store, except that in his case, it was more comparable for him to be on his way to an electrics shop. Either way, his day had just been made.

That is, until the humans did something he should have seen coming. When he reached the point fifty feet from the balloon, he noticed that there was a third intelligent party (there was also a stupid-looking blue blob that looked as though it were in a constant salute) in the basket; a cat that looked remarkably like the picture on the balloon. This cat moved so that he was standing behind and looking into a scope of some kind that was pointed in his direction. Tails stopped his approach and watched the crowd scramble around, an uneasy feeling creeping into the pit of his stomach.

And then it happened. A metal gun-looking thing popped out off the bottom of the basket and shot a rope net directly at Tails, catching him off guard. It wrapped around him, hindering his flight, and he abruptly began plummeting towards the earth, screaming incoherently.

A sixty foot drop and a few tree branches later, and Tails was sitting on the forest floor, scratched, bruised, tangled in the net, and shaking with fright. What was happening? Were the people government operatives trained to track down and capture alien threats? But Tails wasn't a threat; he was just a little genius anthromorphic fox. What did they want with him?

After a minute of struggling with the heavy net and getting nowhere, a shadow fell over the area where he sat. He looked up and saw that the balloon was had stopped at a seventy degree angle of elevation above him, and he heard the two humans inside arguing.

"Do we have to?" the purple-haired adult whined.

"Of course we do!" the woman replied, annoyed. "It's our signature!"

"But it's a Pokémon," he stated.

Pokémon? Tails wondered.

"It doesn't matter," she said. "We're still causing chaos."

The man huffed, but finally agreed. "Fine."

At that, the two humans jumped out of the balloon basket and landed on a branch. Tails watched in confusion as they began some sort of choreographed routine that he guessed they used a lot. It was the girl who started.

"Listen; is that a voice I hear?" she said, adding a lot of expression into it.

"It speaks to me loud and clear," the man added, somewhat less expressionless. Tails guessed that he really didn't want to be doing this.

"On the wind!" the girl exclaimed.

"Past the stars," he said, bored.

"In your ear!" the cat continued.

Hey, it can talk! Tails thought. Maybe it's from our world…?

The girl took it up. "Bringing crisis at a breakneck pace!"

"Dashing hope,"—the man sighed—"and putting fear in its place."

"A rose by any other name's just as sweet."

"I never understood that line," the man said, obviously breaking the pattern.

The woman turned on him viciously. "It rhymes! Stop interrupting and say your line!" she hissed.

He sighed again. "When everything's worse, our work is complete."

"Jessie," said the girl.

"James," he said in monotone.

The cat piped up. "Meowth, now dat's a name!

"Putting the do-gooders in their place," the girl—whose name was obviously Jessie—continued.

"Team Rocket," said James.

Then all of them shouted, "We're in your face!"

"Wooobbuffet!" the light-blue blob concluded from inside the basket.

James sighed, looking depressed. "It's not the same without the little 'Mime mime' at the end…"

"Oh, shut up."

With that, the girls swung down off the branches of the trees, only somewhat gracefully, before she slipped and fell the remaining ten feet onto her tailbone.

"Ow!" she cried out, and despite his fear, Tails giggled. The girl whipped around to glare at him. "What do you think you're laughing at?" she demanded.

His laughter ceased immediately and was replaced with tremors of fright. "I-I-I'm sorry!" he said quickly, trying not to cross the scary woman. He was sure that she was angry enough now that it wouldn't matter anyways, though.

Instead, however, her expression changed from anger to shock. "It talks!" she exclaimed to her companions as they joined her on the forest floor, pointing at the kitsune.

"Really?" James suddenly seemed interested, stepping close to get a better look at the orange creature.

Tails shivered in fear and shrunk away from the man as best he could.

James crouched down so that he was face-to-face with him. "It looks frightened, Jessie," he said, his expression softening.

"Of course it does!" the woman snapped back. "It's trying to gain your sympathy, in hopes that you'll release it. If you were a Pokémon trapped in a net surrounded by strangers, you'd act frightened, too!"

Again with that word, Tails thought.

"It's okay, little guy," James said softly, keeping his eyes on the cowering creature. "We're not going to hurt you."

"Y-You're not?" it asked timidly, barely above a whisper.

James shook his head.

"Don't talk to it, James!" Jessie commanded.

"Why not?"

"Because it's creepy!"

"Hey!" Meowth protested, and Jessie turned to it.

"Nothing against you, Meowth."

The cat crossed its arms. "Humph."

James continued to regard the two-tailed animal with interest. "There's something different about this one, though, Jessie…I don't know what it is, but it's not like any Pokémon I've ever seen before."

"Would you stop staring at that thing and get it in the balloon already?" the woman demanded, completely ignoring James' statement.

Sighing, James grabbed the net holding the Pokémon and slung it over his shoulder, the creature whimpering in fear and struggling to release itself as he did. James felt bad for this animal; they were taking it unwilling out of its habitat, just so it could be presented to their Boss as a sign of their significance. It was cruel, really; what they did for a living. And even with all their hard work, could he ever think of a time when it had paid off? Nope. He was living a life that had no point…and yet, it was the only thing he knew how to do.

The sound of snapping twigs in the trees nearest the trio pulled James out of his thoughts, and he turned in the direction from which it came. "Did you hear that, Jessie?" he asked his companion.

"Hear what?" she said distractedly as she clambered up the rope ladder that Wobbuffet had somehow managed to throw over the side of the basket for them.

James listened again, keeping his eyes on the dark area of the forest. "…Never mind."

Jessie looked down at him. "Well then, what's taking so long? Bring that Pokémon up here so we can take it to the Boss and get our promotion."

"You and your promotion," James muttered, walking over to the ladder. He had barely started up it when a small, scared voice spoke from his back.

"Please," the two-tailed fox Pokémon whispered. "Please let me go."

"I'm sorry, little guy," James replied, "but it's out of my hands."

He grabbed a rung of the ladder and pulled himself up onto it, still holding tight to the net with one hand. But before he had a chance to climb up to the balloon, a low growl sounded from amongst the trees, and a second later, a large gold-white animal pounced out of the shadows and onto James; knocking him off the ladder and onto the ground. James dropped the net holding the orange fox as he was tackled by the golden one, screaming for Jessie and Meowth.

Tails watched the scene with horror. As if it wasn't bad enough he was being captured by the government and labelled a 'Pokémon', whatever that was; now they were all being attacked by a very beautiful, very scary wild animal of some kind that had nine stunning red and gold tails. He hit the ground with a hard thud when the beast tackled James and he now watched wide-eyed as it stood over him, yipping and growling in the man 's face, its red eyes gleaming with anger. As Tails looked closer, though, he realized that it wasn't just any beast; no, this beast was most definitely a large species of wild fox. While it was certainly NOT and anthromorph like himself, it did seem to possess a deep understanding of many things. He felt an abrupt connection between himself and the animal in question, and he suddenly no longer felt so afraid. He knew that, somehow, this fox had come to help him.

"Tales!" the creature growled, and Tails' ears perked up.

Did that fox just say my name?

Everything after that happened so fast, Tails couldn't even tell what was going on. He saw Meowth cannonball from halfway up the ladder towards the awesome creature, with its claws extended, but after that, Tails was too scared to look. He curled up in a ball, hugging his tails to his body and covering his ears, whimpering only slightly, in fear that too much sound would draw the attention of the ferocious animal.

Even with his ears covered, however, he still could hear everything that was happening. He heard James scream, a few grunts of pain, a snarl (presumably from the fox), more screams, a dull thump, more screams, the unmistakable roar of fire, a pop, and finally the war was over.

James sat sprawled in the basket, along with Jessie, Meowth, and Wobbuffet. His clothes were singed and his face was covered in soot and dirt, but he otherwise had somehow managed to remain relatively unharmed. While he looked like crap, he couldn't help but feel a little satisfaction with himself. "I told you this would happen," he said, hiding his smugness very well. "Do you know what this means?"

Jessie and Meowth sighed, and the three of them said together, "Looks like Team Rocket's blasting off again."

Tails reopened his eyes in time to see the hot air balloon spinning off in circles over the horizon, somehow disappearing in a flash of light once it reached a certain distance, with the people inside shouting something about rocket boosters or something that he couldn't make out. He also found the golden fox, which was considerable larger than him, standing over him and eyeing him curiously.

"Uh…Hello," Tails said nervously.

The fox tilted its head to one side, as if contemplating what to do, before leaned over and bit through the rope net holding him.

Before the stunned anthromorph could react, however, the golden animal bent its neck over him and latched onto the back of his neck. Tails let out a startled yelp as he felt its teeth close in on his flesh and fur when the animal lifted his small body, and he was surprised to find that the action didn't hurt. It was definitely weird, but not painful. If anything, it tickled slightly.

"What—?" Tails started, but the question was ripped from his throat as the golden fox made a sudden dash in the direction from which it came, at which time Tails screamed and his hands flew to his eyes. There they stayed until his horror ride was over.