Technically it was a risky business, since Sonic had already shown he could look quite normal even while possessed, but Tails had no reservations. He gave a stifled yelp and threw himself at Sonic, clamping his arms around him and burying his face in his shoulder. Sonic blinked down at his younger brother uncomprehendingly for a second, but almost subconsciously slipped a comforting arm around him.
Shadow relaxed out of his defensive stance, and the others crept in through the door, hesitant. Sonic stared around at them silently, his eyes wide and almost terrified.
"Yeah, yeah, we know," said Shadow, smiling drily. "'What happened?'"
Sonic shook his head like one in a trance, and seemed to process for a few seconds before he could figure out how to speak.
"I remember all of it," he said softly at last.
"You remember?" Shadow raised an eyebrow.
Sonic nodded, swallowing.
"All of it, but . . . I can't . . . " He lifted his free hand and surveyed his now-clawless fingers, looking horrified.
"He's not in any condition to talk," said Rouge briskly, taking charge and starting to herd the others out the door. "You'll get your answers later, you circus-goers, first we've got to give this idiot a cup of soup and a dose of shock medication."
Sonic was subsequently plied with Ramen noodles and some chamomile tea, but he blindly pushed away any of the soothing medications that Team Dark offered him. They figured they'd better not press the matter, since he seemed unstable enough as it was. As of now he seemed to be in survival mode, wolfing down soup without once raising his eyes to anyone or anything else.
Once he had dampened his hunger pangs somewhat, Sonic finally pushed the bowl away, licked his lips covertly, and glanced around the room with the look of a hunted animal. He met Shadow's glance for the briefest instant, but jerked his gaze elsewhere at once as if his eyes burned at contact.
"So," said Rouge, hooking her elbows over the back of the rec room sofa. "Wanna talk about it?"
"Not really," said Sonic softly. He grabbed the spoon from the Ramen noodles and began fiddling with it, chewing his lip.
Shrugging, Rouge got up and motioned the others into the room anyway. G.U.N. security was really having kittens; by now nobody seemed to give a darn about trespassing protocols anymore. Sonic looked more and more cornered as the others gathered around him, his ears folding outwards, his spines quivering slightly as his muscles tensed. He kept his eyes fixed on the spoon, turning it over and over in his hands.
Once everyone had assembled, perched on or leaning against the furniture, silence fell. It carried on for longer than was comfortable.
"So," Rouge prodded at last, her voice surprisingly lulling. Evidently interrogation was a part of G.U.N. training. "You say you remember?"
"Yeah," mumbled Sonic. He ducked his head lower, clearly wishing he could disappear.
"So you were conscious, all this time?" Rouge persisted. "What exactly is it that you remember?"
"I don't know, I don't know," slurred Sonic, shaking his head. "I just . . . It was like my brain shut down, and all I could think about was . . . " He shook his head again, hard. Slowly he reached out his hand and flexed his fingers, as if waiting for claws to sprout from his fingertips again. "I wasn't mindless. I could change when I wanted to, I could think, I could plan, I could come up with tricks and fool you all. But all I could think about was, I wanted to stab, wanted to drive in the poison. Later to . . . to kill. I've never felt anything like it before. Ever."
He took a deep breath, his spines rattling in panic. The others watched in mixed horror and sympathy; never in their lives had they seen Sonic even a third this wrecked up.
"It really happened?" blurted Sonic suddenly, looking up pleadingly. "It didn't. It was a dream, right? I dreamed it. I'm losing my mind, and I dreamed it. I'm just cracking up, that's all."
"No, it happened," said Shadow flatly.
Sonic pawed at his forehead, looking desperate.
"So I really . . . did scratch you up like that?"
"Like what? This?" Shadow flung his wrists out to the sides in a motion vaguely reminiscent of Michael Jackson, showing off a few whitish scars already fading into his fur. "Don't flatter yourself. I've gotten worse damage than this during regular training."
"I could've killed someone," whispered Sonic, swaying.
"What about towards the end?" asked Rouge, steering the topic away slightly. "You must have drunk one or more of Tails' medical brews. Do you remember which one?"
Sonic mumbled ambiguously, his mind clearly still elsewhere.
"Something in a flask. It smelled nice. I was so hungry, I just drank it . . . "
"You don't remember anything? The taste? The specific smell?" asked Tails desperately. Sonic shook his head again.
"I don't believe it," sighed Tails, scruffing up his bangs with one hand. "The cure for the condition was right there in front of me, and now we still don't even know what it is."
"The important thing is, he's cured," said Silver soothingly. "It might not happen again."
"But it might," said Rouge. She glanced back to Sonic. "Don't suppose you'd remember what it was that brought on the attack, do you?"
Sonic shook his head once more, the motion seemingly mechanical by now.
"I went to sleep normal. I woke up around four-thirty, and all I could think of was—was—" He gulped abruptly and stood up. "I'm going out, okay?"
"No, wait!" protested Tails. "We still don't know if—"
"I have to run!" insisted Sonic, backing up. "I can't think straight, I've got to—"
"No, you can't!" Tails grabbed Sonic's arm pleadingly. "You might still be sick, the medicine might have poisoned you too, you might get a regression! You can't be out there all alone where we can't help you!"
Sonic yanked away and stumbled back, looking ready to bolt; his ears were laid back flat again, but now not in anger but in horror. He was suffocating on his own guilt, and the others' worried faces only seemed to terrify him more. Shadow swooped forward and wrenched Sonic's hands behind his back, immobilizing him.
"Let me go!" snapped Sonic, panicked. He struggled only for a second, then suddenly his eyes rolled back in his head, his chin dropped to his chest, and he sagged limply against Shadow's grip. There were several anxious cries.
"What have you done to him?!" howled Amy, her hammer springing into being. Within seconds Rouge was upon her, wrenching the hammer from her hand—it immediately disintegrated—and forcing Amy's hands behind her back as well.
"Get ahold of yourself, woman!" she hissed into Amy's ear. "You're already in danger for trespassing, what do you think happens when you're caught in G.U.N. headquarters with an unauthorized weapon?"
Amy said nothing, her eyes wide.
"If I let you go, does the hammer stay hidden?" growled Rouge. Amy nodded wordlessly, and Rouge gave a snort and pushed her free, none too gently.
"But . . . what have you done?" Amy ventured again, adamant.
"Nothing," said Shadow calmly, tossing Sonic's unconscious form back onto the sofa. "That tea wasn't just chamomile."
"You drugged his drink?!" barked Tails this time, his fur bristling furiously. Shadow raised his eyebrows down at the much shorter fox, looking ever so slightly beleaguered.
"Do you want to run a health scan on him, or not?"
Tails continued to glare.
"It was a normal over-the-counter sleep medication," relented Shadow, eyeing the ceiling as if he suspected his ebbing patience was lurking there. "It takes action within half an hour or so—we figured the way he was acting, a little sleepiness would make him easier to interrogate anyway and keep him from bolting."
Tails sighed and turned away.
"All right. Fine. Thanks . . . I guess. I'll run some tests on him while he's sleeping."
"Should wake up in about six to eight hours," remarked Rouge, reading the back of a small plastic medicine bottle, then tossing it to Tails. "Pop him another one of these if he gets rowdy. Now the lot of you, get out of here."
Looking various degrees of shell-shocked, the other Mobians began to drift silently towards the door. They took Sonic and the heavily tense atmosphere with them.
"Well," said Rouge at length, heaving a sigh and leaning against an armchair. Shadow groaned and threw himself back onto the sofa, closing his eyes.
"Had a long twenty-four hours, huh?" said Rouge. "I was kinda snoozing through a lot of them, but I guess it was rougher on you."
"I could do with never seeing another Mobian again," muttered Shadow. Rouge chuckled and plopped a throw pillow onto his face.
"There, does that help?"
"It does, actually."