Shadow continued to repeat the experiment over and over, trying a different tactic every time, even trying to force a gun into his hallucinations—but every time he woke up, he still scowled in defeat. All through the next day he kept trying, overriding all of Tails' warnings and protests and timid threats, until his fur started to singe off where the electrodes were fastened. Still he refused to stop; he was like one possessed. The idea of a being he couldn't defeat didn't scare him so much as it drove him up the wall.
At last, in the afternoon, Rouge came to Tails' workshop again. She found Shadow sitting back against the wall, out cold, arms folded, his eyelids twitching as he "dreamed" through another battle with the unknown enemy. From nearby, Tails sighed long-sufferingly.
"We kinda need him," said Rouge, pointing at the wire-strung hedgehog. "For G.U.N., ya know?"
"I understand," said Tails, nodding wearily. "When he wakes up from this one, no more. Could you back me up on that?"
"Sure thing, hun," smiled Rouge.
After a few minutes of silence, Shadow suddenly jerked awake with an oath.
"Stupid thing got around it again!" he muttered, rattling his head angrily.
"I think we'd better stop testing for today," interrupted Tails.
"Not a chance. Run it again, kid. I've got a few tactical theories yet."
"No. No more." Tails, emboldened by Rouge's promised support, very ceremoniously shut off the machine and pulled several of the knobs and wires out, tossing them over his shoulder. Shadow gave him a dangerous look, but eventually subsided and snorted in dark amusement.
"Brave little punk, aren't you?" he remarked, starting to pull the electrodes out of his quills.
"She said you're needed at G.U.N.," explained Tails, pointing at Rouge. Shadow glanced over at her, and for the briefest instant one eyebrow quirked down and the other up. The look was gone in a millisecond, but it was unmistakably confusion.
"Come on, wise guy," sighed Rouge. "If enough of your brain remains uncooked that you can walk straight and carry a weapon, you're expected on-duty at G.U.N."
"I'm coming," said Shadow coolly, but again he snuck Rouge a strange look—the kind of look you have when you're sure you recognize that person over there, but you just can't for the life of you remember who it is. Rouge caught his expression this time.
"And I suppose your brain is so fried now that you don't know who I am?" she scowled, folding her arms.
"Don't be ridiculous," scoffed Shadow—but his tone carried a distinct note of bluffing.
"Then tell me. What's my name?"
Shadow fumbled briefly, getting to his feet to mask his lack of answers.
"Oh, what, you don't believe me—" Abruptly there was a thud, and he found himself pinned back against the wall with Rouge's forearm braced against his chest.
"If you are joking, Shadow the Hedgehog, I will kill you," said Rouge, jabbing a finger at his nose. "But you had better be joking."
Shadow glared back at her sullenly. Rouge's eyes widened.
"Don't tell me you're serious."
Shadow continued to scowl. After a moment though, he looked away and rolled his eyes—then ducked just in time to avoid a fist to the head.
"I'm going to kill you very slowly, Shadow the Hedgehog!" averred Rouge, as Shadow slipped out of her reach.
"You flatter yourself," retorted Shadow, entirely unruffled. "What makes you so sure your name is the last thing I'd forget?"
"Well, you're going to remember it now. Because people tend to vividly remember things that cause them a lot of pain."
Tails, grinning up his sleeves, slipped quickly out of the room before the squabblers finished and remembered they had an audience.
Over the next few days, Sonic swung by occasionally, skidding in to look around anxiously and make sure everyone was still all right, dashing back out again to avoid the others' questions and attempts at solace. Tails and some of the others urged him to stay, but he couldn't seem to sit still.
"Coward," said Shadow scornfully. "Screws everything up, then runs from the consequences."
"It's not like his staying here would change anything," said Tails loyally. "And I wouldn't be able to face anyone after something like that either. It's a pretty rough thing to deal with, and running is just Sonic's way of dealing. He'll come back when he's come to terms with it . . . I guess . . . "
The others tried to keep Tails busy, knowing he'd be worried about Sonic too. Overall, it was an edgy and somewhat bewildering time, as everyone tried to settle back down to relative normalcy despite the disturbing events of a few days prior.
On the sixth day, there was a sudden battering on Tails' door early in the afternoon. He was tinkering in the workshop and might not have heard it, but the screams of his name caught his attention pretty quickly.
Bolting to the front door, he threw it open, only for Amy to practically fall through it and whirl to slam it behind herself, nearly catching Tails' fingers in the process.
"Amy?! Amy, what's wrong?"
"It's Cream," gasped Amy, tears standing in her eyes. "It's happening to Cream!"
Tails continued to stare for a second, then recoiled slowly, eyes wide.
"It . . . " he murmured. ". . . That?"
Amy nodded, gradually dissolving into hysterics now that she was indoors and presumably safe.
"I saw her walking along looking kind of angry, and I thought it was nothing and said hello, and she started to scream and tried to kill me!"
Tails was about to stammer another question when there suddenly came a furious hammering on the front door again.
"She followed me here! Don't open it!" yelped Amy, grabbing Tails as if she suspected he'd try to sic Cream on her.
"Open this door!" screamed a voice that was both unfamiliar and horrifically familiar. "Open it right NOW!"
There followed more hammering, and a series of angry snarls. Tails looked at Amy, swallowing.
"What does she look like?" he whispered at last.
"The same as before," said Amy shakily, her gaze flicking nervously to the trembling door again and again. "Her looks haven't changed. But she's . . . oh Tails, Tails . . ."
"We need to call for help," said Tails, forcing himself to keep a brave, relatively calm demeanor—although frankly he felt rather like dissolving into tears himself right now. "Fast."
Amy was near distraction, so Tails sent her off to gather brooms and mops and chairs and anything that seemed like it could possibly, maybe, one way or another be used as a defensive weapon. Judging from the raging he heard outside, he wasn't sure if a broom would do any good, but it gave Amy something concrete to do so she didn't have a complete breakdown.
Meanwhile, the little fox dashed to the phone in his workshop and dialed frantically. No way to contact Sonic, he didn't have his wrist communicator—next party in line was—
"G.U.N. switchboard, can I help you?" asked a clipped voice on the other end.
"I need to speak to Team Dark, please," blurted Tails, his words tripping over each other in their haste. "Anyone in Team Dark, right away!"
"Do you have official business or permission to contact them?" replied the voice calmly. "We cannot allow unauthorized parties to contact G.U.N. numbers."
"It's urgent, an emergency! I need to speak to them!" pleaded Tails, gripping the phone. It had gone oddly silent outside, and he was not enamored with the thoughts of what might be happening.
"I'm sorry, but G.U.N. is not a police force you can just call to deal with civilian crises. If it is the police you need, please call 911—"
"Please!" Tails almost shouted. "Just put me through! You have my caller ID, if they tell you I was a false alarm you can come and punish me!"
There was a silence on the other end for a while.
"Please hold, then," said the voice resignedly. "I'll see if I can get hold of one of them."
"Thank you," gasped Tails, collapsing against the wall in relief. He pressed the phone to his ear, waiting, waiting for someone to speak up on the other end. His eyes strayed to the window of his workshop, and his pupils suddenly dilated in horror—Cream was somehow at the window, when it should have been too high for her even to look through it, and she was swinging a garden trowel over her shoulder.
Smash. A spiderweb of cracks appeared in the glass. Cream raised her trowel again, the now-damaged glass further distorting her face, which was curled into a horrifying wild-eyed sneer. Tails dropped the phone receiver on the floor, lunging at a shelf full of supplies. Frantically he pawed through mounds of knicknacks and machine parts, scattering them far and wide, until he finally clamped down on a roll of duct tape. Throwing himself at the window, just as Cream struck it again and widened the damage, he began to plaster strips of tape across the windowpane desperately, steeling himself against Cream's furious howls and continued banging on the glass. It had to hold, it had to hold—
Suddenly he heard a faint voice coming from the phone.
"Hello? Hello? Hey, is anyone there? Listen, if this is a prank call, G.U.N. can track you down, you'll be in jail before you can—"
Tails hurled himself at the phone and grappled it within shouting distance.
"Come quick!" he hollered. "Come quick!"
Team Dark did come quick. All they found was a duct-taped mostly-shattered window with crates stacked beneath it, and Cheese the chao sobbing on the doorstep.