Yes you read that right, this takes place directly after Animation vs Trash. I decided to take a break from angsty fanfics and write this silly lil thing instead. Hope y'all enjoy :3
~~~
Alan stared in horror at the huge amount of money that Red had clicked in. $18,547,808. He clenched his fists, inhaling a deep breath. He exhaled, slowly, the air coming out with a hissing sound. He forced himself not to get mad. They were only stick figures. And Red, well . . . he was Red. Forcing his anger down, Alan pulled out Adobe Animate and typed a message, his fingers pounding harder on the keyboard than he meant.
[red ya little menace]
From the other side of the screen, Red could tell that Alan was upset. No, not upset. FURIOUS. He gulped, chuckling nervously.
“I-i-i-it was Green and Yellow’s fault!” he blamed, pointing at the two sticks. They were helping each other up from when they’d been thrown across the desktop by Alan in his attempt to stop them from clicking the button.
“It wasn’t me! It was Yellow!” Green cried.
“Was not,” Yellow said, crossing his arms.
Red glared at them. His eyes said “Help me out here!” but no one did. So he glared at Blue. “Your fault,” he said.
“Wasn’t,” Blue said innocently. “Blame Orange. He’s the one who wanted to save the world.” He shot a look at Orange, who was at least trying to be innocent.
“Hey! It was a cool dream!” Orange argued.
“You and your dreams,” Green taunted. “Alan, blame little Sleeping Beauty over here for his silly little dreams!”
“Hey, we were actually saving the world,” Orange said crossly.
“Okay, okay, enough,” Yellow broke in, stopping Orange and Green before they could use violence. “Whatever it was and whoever started it, over 18 million dollars have been wasted on Alan’s part! Do you know how much that is??”
Red tried to calculate the massive amount in his head. “Uh . . . more than we have in all our piggy banks combined,” he squeaked.
“Exactly.” Yellow sighed, crossing his arms again. “We need to figure out a way to get Alan’s money back.
The cursor clicked, catching everyone’s attention.
[dont worry guys, i got it fixed] was the simple message from Alan. (The lack of good grammar and correct punctuation hurt Yellow’s eyes, but he ignored it.)
“How?” Orange asked, the orange text popping up above his head.
[i called Team Seas and explained the mistake, theyre gonna give me my money back]
“That was almost too easy,” Blue laughed.
“But what about saving the world?” Orange asked indignantly.
It took a while for Alan to reply.
[how about we give them ten dollars]
“Fair.” Orange had a defeated look on his face.
[now that thats settled, i have a little job id like for you to get done for me while i work on this animation.]
“Uh-oh, punishment,” Green hissed. Red backed away, trying to look innocent. It totally wasn’t his fault that Alan was temporarily broke.
It had been Green’s idea, to try and mingle with the greys before production went underway. The ones from the last fundraiser video hadn’t been sentient (though they were now, apparently. Blue had seen a group of them hauling some saplings), and it had made things a bit awkward for the quintet.
Yellow was familiarizing himself with the motorboat, every few minutes dodging an icepop projectile anytime Orange shouted “think fast!” from where he was stocking the flavor syrups in the back. (Silly Yellow. He dodged well, but he was supposed to be practicing catching them. With his face.) They chatted with the surfers as they worked, along with Blue, who was folding the snowcone holders. Red had been intending to speak with the fisher, but circumstances had shaken out so that presently Red was speaking with the fish while the fisher looked on.
Red was just explaining the precise stunt of smacking someone in the face with your tail without actually hurting them when he felt someone pass him. Glancing up from where he crouched at the water’s edge, he saw Green making his way towards the group of parent sticks.
Making his rather dogged way.
Excusing himself (to both of them, no he didn’t forget the fisher), Red got up and followed.
“Something wrong?” he asked as he caught up.
“I don’t like how they’re looking at Orange,” Green muttered.
Falling into step, Red took a second look at their targets. The three greys in question were speaking in hushed voices, and every few seconds one or two or sometimes all three of them would dart a quick glance in the direction of the motorboat, where Orange had emerged from the back and seemed to have drawn the surfers into some story or other.
“Last time he tried doing a whole lecture before suggesting I just make something for the fundraiser if I wanted to contribute so badly,” he heard Orange elaborate, his voice carrying in his enthusiasm. “But this time he just dropped us all in an email with his screencap footage and sent us right to the folks in charge. Subject of the message was ‘that seemed coordinated.’” The voice briefly gained a sly lilt. “In his defense, it was. We absolutely coordinated that.” A giggle. “So, once we…”
Red tuned him out as they approached the greys, noticing that Green had slowed his approach to a more casual pace, posture opening up into something curious and inviting. Okay, impartial it was, then.
“I don’t care how he’s acting right now,” one of them was saying, “I know what I’m seeing, and I don’t want to risk-“
“Excuse me,” Green interrupted pleasantly. “Is there something we can help with?”
The three greys turned in surprise. Red anticipated either an attempt to brush them off or some sort of accusation, but what they got instead was one of the parents sighing like his and Green’s arrival was comparable to the finding of a puzzle piece that had been previously lost. “Yeah, why don’t we just ask these guys,” this one said to the others. “I mean they’d probably be able to give us the best answer, considering they seem alright.”
“Or they could be biased in his favor,” suggested another. “Yeah they’re comfortable, but what if their circumstances are unique?”
“Folks, I have no idea what you’re on about,” Green cut in. “I just suspect that it’s about that orange fellow over there and I’m wondering what, exactly.”
The other two greys looked to the one who had been speaking when they arrived. The stick in question shuffled in place for a moment, before meeting both their gazes and asking:
“How…did you meet your…companion?”
“…how did we meet him?” Green checked, sounding as taken aback as Red felt. “He saw us sparring and wanted to join in.”
“That’s it?” voiced the skeptical grey.
Well, no, that wasn’t really it. Orange had technically broken into their house, of sorts, and hadn’t even thought to introduce himself until confronted with an enthusiastically welcoming Green.
“Yeah, it was that simple,” Red said instead. “He’d only just been drawn, I think he was just curious. Meeting him is actually what made the four of us self-aware.”
“See, he’s fine,” the tired grey voiced.
But the nervous grey didn’t appear soothed, looking more anxious if anything. “He started spreading sentient influence that soon?! Oh, I knew it, he has to be connected!”
The tired grey facepalmed. “It’s normal for handdrawns to self-animate with a lot less prompting than our type.”
“That’s not the issue here,” the skeptical grey cut in. “The issue is him bringing other things to life around him. That, plus the art style.”
Red was thoroughly confused.
Green seemed to pick up on something, though. “You got a problem with him being handdrawn?” he asked flatly.
“Whoa, whoa,” said the skeptic, seeming to realize that a faux pas had occurred. “I swear, we have nothing against handdrawns, this isn’t about that.”
The nervous one nodded in agreement. “I just…him specifically…that’s kind of a recognizable art style, you know?”
“You…know…his animator?” Now Green sounded puzzled, too.
“What? No, I don’t think anybody knows their animator, but it's obviously the same one.”
Red watched Green blink. “I feel like we’re talking about two different things here.”
“Look, not all of us were created just for the fundraiser, some of us have been around the block a few times, and those of us who have know what it means when a handdrawn in that style appears. It means you grab what matters most to you and run!”
The tired one spoke up again, apparently exasperated with how vague the other two were being. “Has he ever tried to kill anyone?”
Red knew that his impulsivity could cause problems. He tended to forget in the heat of the moment, of course, but in a general, outside-looking-in sense, he recognized this flaw within himself.
He liked to think, though, that it was a blessing in some situations. Like this one. Because if this conversation was a horse-race, then Green’s teeth were the gates, and Red could vividly imagine the horse being named “what’s a little murder between friends” and he was not willing to bet on that winning the greys over.
So, he wholeheartedly jumped the gun.
“Whoa whoa, easy there,” he scolded, trying to use a jovial tone. “You think we’d take him out in public like this if we thought he might start a murder spree?”
Thankfully, Green caught on, and nodded. “Yeah, what the heck? Why would we do that? Why would he do that?”
The nervous one seemed to draw up short at that one, while the skeptic simply continued to frown. The tired one huffed a “told you” before turning and leaving the group with a half-hearted wave, calling out to one of the children.
“I still don’t really know what this is about,” Red offered, “but if you’re worried about your kids being safe or something, you don’t have to be.”
“Yeah,” Green added, “he’s not gonna blow up the pier or anything.”
It was clear to Red that Green had meant it as a joke, so the genuine relief that seemed to suffuse the nervous grey was a little strange.
The skeptic hid a flinch, before turning to the other. “Production is gonna start soon, we should get the kids.”
The nervous one nodded, looking back at Red and Green as the two greys walked away. “Thank you so much, you don’t know how much concern you’ve alleviated.”
Red turned to look at Green. Green turned to look at Red.
Aka I saw the Generic Sticks and thought it would be fun to draw my ocs there. And proceeded to spend a lot of time editing that scene to be blank. It took a half hour. (Beige and pink use the existing poses, while indigo and Lavender do not.)
If you use this blank template, I’d really appreciate it if you linked back to my post, or reblog it with your version, since it took so long to do.
