This one was indeed late, but not for the reason I had expected... I signed up for AO3 and cross-posted everything I've done, minus Virtua Cops because I want to touch that one up first- it was my first story so my writing could use some skill leveling. That was a big time sink because I touched these stories up too in the process and have the revised versions of each on both sites. I'm not favoring one over the other; I do prefer FFN for functionality but AO3 does have some nice features. Feel free to double dip and represent if you use both sites.

Angels hasn't been too changed except for bulking up Chapter 1 a bit, but man did I improve the end of Seraphim's second chapter, which I had originally just ran out of steam on.

Anyway... 3 reviews in one chapter! That's exponential growth! Glad everyone's liking it and not thinking it's going TOO far... Personally I would have wanted to wait a little bit longer for certain things to happen but I'm currently winging it. Who knows, maybe I'll come up with more chapters retroactively: nothing is set in stone on this site, so stories can always evolve. That's one of my personal protips.

Anyway, this is not my proudest chapter, but it was an event important enough to depict, even if I couldn't really see how to stretch it out into a decent chapter (I have absolutely no sense of ceremony) so I merged it with another idea I also wasn't entirely sure what to do with. This chapter was actually improvised and not part of my original plan.

"You nervous, kid?"

Tails looked to the bat sitting in the chair next to him in the waiting room. Knowing that there was no sense in trying to lie to Rouge, he muttered, "Is it that obvious?" As much as he hated to admit it, he was always anxious about meeting someone new, let alone possibly several at once. Some anxiety was normal, but probably not as much as he had. But was it any wonder when his childhood largely consisted of being ostracized by society?

"Don't fret about it. Take it from me, you're definitely NOT in their bad graces. Everyone likes YOU." The super-relevant response made him wonder if his thoughts somehow had been conveyed through his body language.

"That's... not entirely accurate."

"Well, it is on this planet at least. I wouldn't be surprised if they made cute little plush dolls of you." He mulled her words over. His past track record of positive relationships wasn't very good, though his ratio HAD drastically improved once humans had entered the equation. It was ironic really; back home he was different from everyone else of his kind. On Earth, even though he was far more different from the dominant species, he was seemingly no more different to them than the rest of his friends.

The doors opened to reveal Agent Topaz standing in the doorway, a friendly enough smile on her face that managed to be reassuring somewhat. "Come on in." They all entered the office of GUN Commander Walters, who stood behind his desk. Also present and standing off to the side was Captain Westwood. Topaz walked over to take a place to his side, followed by Rouge to form a line in a manner he had seen before. He knew he was to stand before the Commander, though he wasn't so practiced at posture. He did his best to be as straight upright as possible, arms at his sides, and head tilted upwards, though he had to do that last bit anyway to actually see a human's face.

The Commander had a far more welcoming demeanor than was expected of the boss to the perpetually stone-faced Westwood. "Tails... It's a pleasure to finally meet you." Well, he seems nice enough... "At ease." The Commander even seemed to be faintly smiling, though perhaps it was just amusement at a little fox's attempts to project a serious front. Having been given permission to do so, he let himself stand more naturally. "You both did great work on the retrieval mission. Rouge commended your performance out there." He couldn't help but glance to the bat, who gave a little wink back. "We train our agents in a wide array of abilities, but you two already possess a great deal of them. And few of even our agents are fully certified to fly aircraft, let alone have such a comprehensive knowledge of electronic devices in general." There was a silence where he would probably have been modest and brushed off the praise if he wasn't too nervous to dare risking his positive status right now. "As of this moment, you are hereby instated as a provisional GUN operative." Walters reached into a desk drawer and pulled out what look like a badge, which he held out in offering. "Now, you're not officially an agent of the US government or any kind of allied task force. So remember, you are thus not to reveal yourself as such to anyone outside the agency. These credentials are simply for accessing GUN's facilities or identifying yourself to other agents as needed."

"Yes sir," Tails answered as he took the badge and looked it over. Somehow, he had expected it to look a lot more impressive.

"Welcome to the agency." Walters stuck out a hand. Switching the badge over, he took the offered hand for a shake. He turned to the others in the room. Though it was somewhat expected, it was still slightly surprising seeing Captain Westwood offer a hand next. While the two didn't have the same contentious relationship as with Rouge, the high-ranking GUN agent was still intimidating even when being professionally neutral. The friendlier Agent Topaz was next in line for a shake, her smile even warmer than before. Last but not least was Rouge, with easily both the biggest and warmest smile of the bunch. When the handshake concluded, she didn't let go, instead pulling him forward into a hug. While his head was trapped over her shoulder, he could faintly hear Topaz chuckling. He imagined Westwood was rolling his eyes at what was surely not proper military ceremonial conduct. "Rouge will show you around the place. You're both dismissed." Huh, that's it?

The bat broke the embrace but kept her hand on his back to guide him out of the room. Once they were heading down the hallway she spoke. "Welcome to the club, kid. I didn't know you had it in you." Her voice had a bit of exaggerated awe.

"What? Being a GUN agent?" he asked, unsure what she was getting at.

"Not that part... just the way you became one. Who'd have thought you of all people would take after me? We're BOTH outlaws recruited by GUN now. And for the same offense, no less."

"Which is what, exactly?" he asked curiously. Did she commit other crimes besides stealing from museums?

"Breaking and entering, silly."

No bells were rung yet. "What?"

"Don't try to be all coy with me, cutie. You really think I DIDN'T hear all about you breaking into that GUN base to free Sonic?"

"Oh. That."

"Yeah, that. I'm quite impressed. It was real bold. And so rebellious." She sounded almost dreamy.

"That wasn't..." he began before reconsidering. Okay, it actually was. Of course, he was acting in the cosmic right, and he did end up saving the lives of countless soldiers from a coincidental attack by Robotnik in the process, but there was the sticky little fact that it was still technically illegal to attack a military installation and orchestrate a jailbreak, among all other sorts of crimes that might even constitute an act of terrorism. But considering Sonic WAS wrongly arrested due to being mistaken for a different hedgehog with supersonic speed that was going around causing havoc (a shockingly common thing for superheroes) and the fact they had ended up saving the entire world as a direct result of Sonic's liberation, the government was willing to pardon his little rogue escapade (and resulting destruction of several million dollars' worth of military hardware) if he agreed to be just a little more... inclusive with GUN from time to time.

"Oh, don't be so modest. You may be a real big sweetheart, but you've also totally got a bad boy side hidden away. I like that."

He let out a nervous laugh at her delivery of the last compliment. "Well... I suppose." While he wasn't keeping track, he estimated at least a third of her conversations with others included at least one line that could be construed as flirting. Being a little too young for that sort of thing, her conversations with him specifically were more in line with... well, somewhere between that of an older sibling or adult platonically fond of a child not their own. But her voice just naturally had a way of making the words sound a lot less innocent. "But there is one major difference, Rouge."

"What's that?"

He smirked. "GUN didn't actually catch me."

She pouted. "Jerk. I'm not gonna feel sorry for you now."

"Why? What's gonna happen?" he asked, getting an uncertain feeling.

"Don't be scared, Tails... It's just time for you to meet some more of your coworkers." The knot in his stomach returned as she pushed open a pair of double doors to reveal a gymnasium. This particular gymnasium was not equipped for playing sports and having fun but for practicing combat maneuvers of varying levels of lethality... and having fun depending on one's mindset. It was occupied by about thirty people who didn't seem to have been practicing... more like just lying in wait. "Hey everyone!" Rouge called out in an overly excited voice, "It's Tails!"

The introvert to Rouge's extrovert, he simply did a lazy wave and meekly said, "Uh, hi." The attempt to not look shy evidently failed, because a female agent went AWWW.

"Alright Tails, it's time for your welcoming... crucial?" The bat pronounced the word uncertainly, with accents upon the wrong syllables.

"You mean crucible?" he asked worriedly.

"Whatever. Don't worry, they're just gonna all gang up on you in order to knock you down. They'll try not to hurt you... too much." He simply gave her a blank stare. "You can't win this fight; it's just a matter of lasting as long as you can. Lucky for you, you won't have to fight me, so you'll have a fair chance of lasting more than a few seconds."

While appreciated, the comedic relief didn't quite live up to its name. "Ha-ha-ha."

"But I already told the others that you're a tough kid and they shouldn't go easy on you, so don't disappoint them." Now THAT was the opposite of 'relief'. "Take your shoes off, kiddo." He noticed the agents weren't wearing any shoes either, presumably for safety. But why?

"Uh, what exactly are we supposed to do here?" he asked uneasily. "We're not supposed to be actually throwing punches or kicks at each other, are we?"

"No punches, but maybe kicks. They're trying to pin you down, and you're trying to stay standing. Just fend them off. I know you can handle yourself. Now shoes off." He removed the articles of clothing in question, taking it slow to delay the inevitable. Rouge took the shoes, then walked over to Westwood and Topaz, who had entered the gym at some point and were standing off the matted floor, clearly to observe. No pressure...

He watched as the other GUN agents all approached in a gang, a couple of their grins looking somewhat sadistic. His stomach tightening as unpleasant memories came back. Suddenly the agents transformed, one becoming a rabbit, one a cat, one a bear, and one a fox- with one tail of course- if anyone else had a second tail, he wouldn't be different would he? There were many more, but he wasn't able to put names to all the faces. Did all of his tormentors ever actually know his name either, or did they only know him as the freak with two tails?

He closed his eyes and tried to focus. That was THERE; he was HERE. They weren't animals; they were humans... Well, technically humans were animals too, but they weren't the same type of animals. They didn't hate him; they liked him... didn't they? They called him cute, hugged him, petted him... which was admittedly somewhat galling to him, but it was clearly affectionate. Not like back home, where everyone just avoided, insulted, or maybe even hit him, depending on their disposition.

"Tails?" Rouge softly asked, a tinge of concern in her voice. "You ready?"

His eyes opened and he answered, "Yeah," putting on his strongest front.

"GO!" The voice was probably Westwood's but there was no time to care about that when the agents rushed forward. Oh crap, what do I do!? He put up his hands as if to simply hold back the first agent's entire body. The man easily pushed his arms aside, put a hand on his shoulder, and hooked a leg around one of his... then simultaneously pulled the leg out while pushing him down to the mat, falling on top to pin him down. That didn't take long... But although down, he wasn't out, easily lifting the human up just enough to slip out from underneath. Coming back up on his feet, the man also rose, though only to all fours before lunging at him again. This time he pushed the guy aside to crash onto the mat emptyhanded.

Someone else grabbed him before he could even turn. Grabbing the offending arms back, he ducked and twisted away, pulling more than throwing the grabber off their feet and to the mat as well. Without even looking he did a spinning sidestep out of the way of another diving recruit, who joined the others. He ducked to the side below another pair of arms, and then another, zigzagging through the crowd of humans. It was going well until someone tripped him.

Landing flat, he looked up at a man looming above like a menacing bear. Scampering on all fours, he went right between the man's legs. Another pair of legs awaited on the other side... However, their owner dropped onto knees, so he ended up ramming into a stomach instead. The guy grabbed him around the waist even while being bowled over backwards, resulting in the fox being lifted up and over in an impromptu suplex. The human got it worse though, face getting smothered by the fox's body. He quickly wrenched out of the hold while the agent coughed out a mouthful of fur.

Back on his feet, he was unprepared for someone to kick him in the side. Further attempts indicated the target was actually his legs. This again? He blocked a couple more kicks before simply grabbing the entire limb... then kicking the other leg out to dump the recruit on the ground. Another recruit charged, then suddenly dropped and slid to kick his legs out from underneath. Falling onto his twin-tailed tushie, the agent pressed the advantage and went for the pin but he brought up his arms and legs while falling backward and caused the human to flip over in an awesome but equally unintentional Judo-styled throw. Rouge whooped. "Go Tails!"

Back on his feet, he ducked and put out an arm to clothesline another charging pair of legs. He froze at the sight of the next opponent: female- his biggest weakness. She had the same look Rouge got when she wanted to hug the life out of him. He ultimately just deked around her. She fell on him for a tackle but overshot at such close range, her hands only managing to run through his fur.

He stood back up just in time for another agent to come sliding in low, this time using their legs to trap his and cause him to topple over. He freed his legs and scampered up onto all fours before someone tackled him from the side. They rolled over and over, Tails using their momentum to keep going until getting his legs up to push them apart and break the hold. He was only back on his knees when someone grabbed him in a bearhug from behind, though underneath the arms. Reaching back, he yanked the grabber's legs out, sending them both falling backward. The agent groaned in a way that suggested the fox's weight may have landed upon a sensitive area. The hold weakened, allowing him to wrench free and get back to his feet once more...

Someone else was flying towards him for a tackle. He simply jumped over the incoming person as well as the ones standing immediately behind. The superhuman jump had been instinctive but would probably be considered unfair for this little exercise. Flying would definitely NOT be allowed, which was unfortunate, because that left him with no option but to be helpless in the air as his descent carried him towards a rather sizable man with arms spread wide in a mocking invitation. He was caught... and immediately body slammed into the matt hard enough to bounce. He managed to slip out of the pin, but the agent held onto an arm. Back on his own feet, he pulled away, dragging the grabber across the matt.

Someone else grabbed his other arm. He retaliated by pulling the kneeling recruit down as well. With a persistent human hanging on each arm now, the small fox could only swing his arms while taking small steps. "Come on, Tails! Keep going!" Rouge yelled in cheerleading fashion, but her spirit booster was probably not going to save him at this point. This is bad... Someone dropped to the floor to grab one of his legs, jeopardizing his ability to move without losing balance. Now I'm really in trouble... Someone grabbed his other leg. Well, that's probably it...

Both legs were pulled out and he crashed to the mat like a giant being felled in some fairy tale. His arms were bent behind his back as agents kneeled on him. With all his limbs being held, he could only flop like a fish in an attempt to escape. The kneeling agents fell off but kept their grips. "Hold him down!" Several recruits threw their bodies atop his in a dogpile, flattening him back down. Now his arms, legs, AND tails were all being restrained.

Just as the weight of the dogpile started to get concerningly heavy, a sharp whistle blast blew. "Okay, that's enough!" Everyone immediately stopped. Fortunately, Captain Westwood was well on top of supervising exercises.

Rouge walked up to the pile of human bodies with just the fox's head sticking out. "Got any fight left?"

"Hang on, let me check..." With an unnecessary vocalization of his efforts, he wormed his body once more in an attempt to raise it up. The pile moved slightly but not enough to bother trying further. "Nope, I'm done."

The agents got off him, though the ones holding his arms didn't let go, pulling him up to his feet. They kept holding on, which was for the best, as he wasn't ready to be standing under his own power just yet. Rouge stepped forward and patted his defenseless head. "Good job, kiddo. You lasted almost as long as me." She stepped away, but another agent quickly took their chance to run a hand through his head fur as well. Then another, and another, and another... He soon lost count but his estimate would have been EVERYONE.

"Hey!" he weakly protested in embarrassment, still restrained from doing anything more than ineffectually ducking. His traitorous namesakes wagged happily. Eventually, his arms were released, though not before his captors got their turns in. After looking around to make sure nobody else was going to make a move, he turned to Rouge, who was standing next to Topaz. Both wore matching smiles. He wondered if the latter had joined in the petting line. Did Westwood? Yeah right... Recomposing himself, his attempt at small talk was to ask, "So, how long was it?"

Topaz checked the stopwatch in her hand. "Almost a minute and thirty seconds."

"Huh." It sure had felt longer than that. "How long did you last, then?" he asked Rouge.

The bat looked to the human, apparently the designated timekeeper for these things. "Almost three minutes, if I remember right." So about twice as long as me... Maybe his disappointment showed through, because the agent said, "Hey, few recruits survive to the minute mark." She suddenly smiled mischievously. "Plus, I'm sure you won't make the same mistake she did right after."

"DON'T," Rouge warned.

He automatically asked, "Don't what?"

The bat pointed at him. "Don't ask." Then she aimed the finger at Topaz. "Don't tell."

There was a sizable pause as the human agent may have considered, the smile never fading, before going ahead. "She challenged Westwood to a one-on-one fight afterwards. For keeps."

"STOP," Rouge demanded.

It was too good for him to resist. "Dare I ask who won?"

The bat glared at him. Topaz stated the obvious answer: "Westwood." Then she kept going. "He had her quickly pinned on the floor in a limb lock, crying and-"

"NO! Don't listen to her! That's a lie!" The bat's face turned red, and seemingly out of more than just anger. "I lost, sure, but I wasn't crying!"

He believed that she didn't cry, but the degree of her embarrassment suggested that she had nonetheless expressed her discomfort in an undiginified manner. "I'm sure you weren't," he said in an attempt to placate that was undermined by a smile.

She threw an arm around his neck in a casual but aggressive headlock. "Do YOU wanna go a round with me right here, Foxboy?" she whisper-hissed.

His smile evaporated and he was only able to emit, "Uh..." She could still be quite intimidating when she wanted to.

"Then keep your snout shut."

He did.

DVD Commentary: ANOTHER FUN CHAPTER THAT SUDDENLY GOT DARK. I didn't plan it at all. In fact, I actually winged this one except for the idea that Tails' training involved getting swarmed, which probably wouldn't have been much of a chapter by itself. I'm not 100% this should be AFTER the previous chapter but I figured Tails wouldn't just be simply ASKED out of the blue to join GUN, it'd be after a spontaneous need for his help. Plus, it was my original idea that Rouge personally sought Tails' help for the mission in the absence of official GUN support... though perhaps GUN anticipated it- that's what having deniable assets is all about after all...

I wondered if my Sonic universe would actually have Sonic-themed merchandising. I mean, they've got to be on MC Hammer's level at least, right?

I'm not sure if GUN is supposed to be exclusively one nation's or a joint taskforce like NATO. While the name seems to generally be Guardian Unit(s) of Nation(s) -note that Japanese doesn't usually specify plurals- it has also been Guardian of (the?) United Nations in at least one game... which definitely sounds better. So I covered both bases in my dialog. I guess GUON or GOUN didn't quite have the same ring to it. On that note, I don't know if the United Federation is supposed to be the United States or an entire group.

I entertained the idea Tails going slightly full PTSD but I didn't want to go THAT far... and that would probably be out of my range. In retrospect, it would probably have made more sense in Angels, where his opponents actually WERE bad guys... hmmm... maybe I DO have some more changes to make, though that chapter is already long enough. Don't worry, I've got some more Tails backstory ideas to drop coming up- it isn't all Rouge's pity party.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna go watch Sisu.