Chapter 3: Haunting Memories

"Why can't you hang out with me?" Bailey said frantically to a dark haired girl. He had been alone for a while and had tried to hang out with someone he called friend.

"I'm sorry. I'm busy." The girl said looking away from Bailey.

Bailey was frustrated with the response. "You always say that, yet whenever you're free, you never invite me to hang out. It's like you never consider me."

The girl got up and looked at him. "Well I'm sorry. Maybe if you weren't so weird and annoying, maybe I would hang out with you."

"How can you say that? You never gave me a chance to do something with you." Bailey said while taking a step back.

"You know what? Maybe we aren't friends. Maybe you just think we are, but really you want more than that. I have a boyfriend now. You need to let go." The girl spoke with anger as she turned away from Bailey.

"I know you have a boyfriend, but that doesn't mean we can't be just friends. Look, I know I liked you at some point, but I just want to talk to someone okay. If being just friends is all you want, then its fine." Bailey said solemnly.

The dream fast forwards to another place in Bailey's mind where he's talking to the girl's boyfriend and some of her other friends with Bailey's crush standing behind them.

"What the hell guys? Why are guys like this?" Bailey was standing with a saddened look on face as his crushes' friends were all angry with him.

"Because we know you're only around us for Chloe. You don't care about us or anything. You just want to get in Chloe's pants." One of Chloe's friends said angrily at Bailey.

"That's not true! You guys aren't even giving me a chance to prove I can be a good friend." Bailey spoke while feeling tears in his eyes. He stared at Chloe, his crush, hoping that she would step in and vouch for him.

Chloe's boyfriend then stepped up and said, "Well guess what? We don't want you here. You're just an annoying dude that's desperate for friends. We only hung out with you because Chloe convinced us to and we felt sorry for you. Now we don't think that anymore. So take a hike and never come back here again and stay away from my girl." Chloe's boyfriend then pushed Bailey away from them.

Bailey stood there in sadness, anger, and self-hatred. He felt the tears fall from his eyes. Ultimately, he listened and ran out of the classroom away from Chloe and the rest of her friends.

The scene changed and Bailey was hiding in an abandoned building while the military searched around for him. Bailey hid behind a pillar as then looked around. They were about fifty soldiers after him. One in particular, a man in military gear called out to him.

"Bailey To, by order of the United States government, you are to come with us to Washington D.C. Please make this easy for us. We don't want to have another incident like with that Johnson family."

Bailey knew who was talking and his eyes began to glow a bright blood red and his anger grew within him. His voice grew hostile as he yelled out, "You fucking bastard! You killed them! You fucking killed them! Those were good, innocent people and you mercilessly killed them. You're a heartless bastard you know that?"

The lead officer gave a chuckle and said, "You know very well that the President gave an executive order to bring you in. Those people, the Johnson family, clearly disobeyed the law so they were clearly not innocent."

Bailey appeared from the pillar and the soldiers all pointed there weapons at Bailey. He felt so much hatred for everything that happened to him. He wanted to kill the lead officer, but held every fiber of his being back.

"So you killed them in cold blood?" Bailey screamed in anger.

"It was my call and I made the choice. It definitely got your attention though didn't it? Restrain the boy now! The general officer ordered his soldiers.

One soldier obeyed and walked slowly to restrain Bailey. He whispered to Bailey telling him to make this easy for everyone, but before could handcuff Bailey, the young shapeshifter forced pushed the soldier back into his squad making all of them fall down. Some were not affected and they opened fire on Bailey. Bailey them shapeshifted a massive shield from his left arm and blocked all the bullets fired at him. He looked behind for exit and saw a door that looked promising. He then raced through the door at supersonic speeds and managed to escape from the military once again.

The scene switched to a school in Bailey's dimension. It wasn't really a memory that he remembered from his past. No, this was something else. He was standing alone until the then saw Eggman with a giant robot. It had large tentacles, and a massive body to boot. Bailey also saw Chloe being held in a prison capsule inside the robot.

"Bailey help me please!" Chloe screamed.

Before Bailey could do anything he heard Eggman's menacing voice say, "Say goodbye to the love of your life Shapeshifter." It was in that moment; Bailey would watch Chloe be shocked to death by Eggman's prison capsule. Bailey yelled in fear as he watched his friend be killed in front of his eyes. He fell to his knees as he began to cry. The scene faded as he heard someone whisper his name over and over.

"Bailey…Bailey, wake up!" Tails said as he shook Bailey frantically.

Bailey finally awoke from his nightmare and screamed Chloe as he rose up. Tails jumped back scared at the sound of Bailey screaming the name of someone he's never heard of. Bailey's breathing was rapid and he looked around noticing that he was still in Mobius and in Tails' place. He saw Tails standing there awkwardly in fright.

"Are you okay? I came in to wake you up and I heard you talking in your sleep."

"I'm ok. I just…had a bad dream." Bailey then got out of bed.

"Do you want to talk about it? It seemed really bad and who is this Chloe person you shouted for when you woke up?" Tails said trying to help his new friend.

Bailey thought about telling Tails, but shook his head. "It's not important. Don't worry about it." He then walked past Tails to the door.

"Are you sure?" Tails said as he followed Bailey out the door.

"Yes I'm sure. What are we doing today and where's Sonic?" Bailey said while walking down the stairs

"Helping regain your memories remember? Also knowing Sonic like I do, he's probably out running." Tails said with a grin.

Indeed Sonic was of course running. Exploring Mobius like he always did. He running around Green Hill admiring the scenery, but later stopped near Tails' house. The blue blur took a moment to collect his thoughts about yesterday and how he met a human from another dimension. He wasn't sure how it was possible. Sure there were some humans in Mobius but a human from another dimension? It didn't seem likely.

"Maybe Bailey is from the Sol Dimension. That would make sense. It's the only other dimension I've seen and heard of. Wait if that's the case, why didn't he just tell me that? I'm sure if he's from there, he would have heard about me. Maybe Blaze kept Mobius a secret from the people in her dimension." Sonic scratched his head. "No way that doesn't sound like Blaze. She wouldn't do that." He began to walk towards Tails' house while thinking about his new friend. "Maybe I should ask him more about it." Sonic thought. He then ran the doorbell.

Tails and Bailey sat on the couch silently. Bailey was still thinking about his dream and what the last part meant. He was confused about why he saw Chloe and Eggman in the same place on Earth. Tails wanted to try and talk to Bailey about his nightmare but didn't want to protrude on Bailey's personal life too much. The fox genius then heard the doorbell ring and ran over to the door knowing it was Sonic. He greeted his longtime friend.

"Hey Sonic we were waiting for you." Tails said while smiling.

"Hey Tails. Bailey's still around right?" Sonic asked as he walked into Tails' house.

"Yeah I'm right here." Bailey stood up and waved at Sonic.

"Hey Bailey, did you sleep well last night?" Sonic asked as he sat next to Bailey on Tails' couch.

"Um…yeah I did sleep well. The bed was comfy and it was a pretty peaceful night." Bailey said looking a bit uneasy. "Thanks for letting me stay Tails."

"No problem. It was the best we could do since you helped us with Eggman you know." Tails went over and sat across from Bailey and Sonic.

Sonic began to examine Bailey a little bit. He definitely seemed off like he was hiding something. He really wanted to get to know this human more considering he met him in Angel Island of all places. He decided to ask this question a bit carefully to avoid upsetting his new friend.

"Say Bailey, are you really from another dimension right?

Bailey looked at Sonic a bit nervously but calmly answered the question. "Well we did determine that right?"

"Yeah we did, but you said to us that you don't remember how you got to Angel Island but since you're from another dimension, you could've gotten there by a portal right?" Sonic looked at Bailey a bit more seriously and less of a smile.

"Well if this portal is some big purple vortex, then I guess that is how I got here then." Bailey's leg, but force of habit, shook nervously.

"Wait if that's the case, then why did you tell us that you lost your memories?" Tails asked a little confused.

"I don't know. I kind of panicked I guess."

Sonic put his hand on Bailey's right shoulder. "Hey listen. I know we just met, but you have to hide anything from us. We're here to help you." Sonic began to grin a little.

"Really? I…I…look I don't want to talk about this. I'm sorry that I lied you guys about the memory thing. It was complete bullshit obviously and I'm sure that Shade and Knuckles could tell I wasn't telling the truth. I just don't want to talk about my dimension." Bailey looked down at his feet looking really sad and lost.

Sonic ultimately decided that it wasn't best to keep making Bailey uncomfortable with all his questions, so he then started thinking of ways to cheer him up. He rubbed his chin a bit as he thought about it and came up with something.

"Hey since you're here in our world, how about me and Tails show you around Mobius for a bit. It'd be great to see new places and you wouldn't feel so lost."

Bailey looked up and thought about the question. It was something he wasn't used to but he knew Sonic was right. He really didn't know this place and exploring would really help.

"Alright, I guess that's something we can do." Bailey looked at Sonic with a soft smile.

"Great! I guess we should get ready then, because we're heading out right now." Sonic gave his signature smile

"Yeah let's head to Station Square. We can show the city and get something to eat. We'll walk there instead of taking the Tornado." Tails said.

The three left the house to Station Square. Sonic and Tails walked ahead a little bit while Bailey lagged a little bit behind them. Tails saw that Bailey was far enough from hearing distance and whispered to Sonic.

"Hey Sonic, I went to go wake Bailey up today and he was talking in his sleep for some reason." Tails looked back at Bailey who was looking down at the ground.

Sonic was surprised by this news. "He was doing all of that?"

"Yeah he was saying things like why don't you want to hang out with me and something about killing someone in cold blood. Then he kept calling for some person named Chloe." Tails looked a little worried. "I'm not sure what all this mean Sonic, but there's definitely something that he's not sharing with us."

Sonic thought to himself to a moment. "This is troubling stuff Tails. I think right now we have to wait for him to talk about it. It's clear that he doesn't want to talk about his dimension for a reason. We should work on gaining his trust for now and see what happens in the meantime." He said reassuring his best friend.

"Okay, I hope that works. Whatever it is, it really seems to trouble him." Tails said as looked at Bailey one time seeing that he was looking at his wrists.

"Don't worry buddy. We'll show that we're here for him. After all, he is our friend right?" Sonic said with a smile.

"Yeah you're right." Tails began to smile to.

Bailey walked behind Sonic and Tails as he looked at this left wrist .The veins in his body glowed red and he was beginning to wonder when he should tell his new friends the whole truth. He feared they would not like what they see in his powers or what he has done in the past. He thought of Chloe and how he tried to be close to her and her other friends hoping that this time, things will be different.

Wow. Nine months since I worked on this story. I guess you could say I had writers block right? I was so busy with school and now I'm a senior in High School. So much has happened since and recent events in my life as well as Sonic Forces made me want to write this story again. I appreciate the new followers who patiently waited for this story. Hopefully the next chapter doesn't take as long to make.