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Tell Me Tuesday (it's still Tuesday somewhere)

Thanks for the tags, @woundedsoul12, @necromanticsoul, and @chaosherald! I loved both of your explanations.

Well, inspired by ChaosHerald's breakdown of last year's Rook Week, I thought it would be fun to do similar for one of my fandom-weeks-turned-cohesive-story. And while The Neromenian Job is right there, I actually want to go to last year's Sonally Week offering (hopefully last August is recent enough).

So apologies to my Dragon Age mutuals, but I'm going to ramble a bit about Sonic stuff.

Let's start with last year's prompt list for the week. The overarching theme was "Endless Possibility," and the prompt list was intended to evoke different alternate universes. The prompts themselves were:

Classic

Fantasy

Noir

Horror

Superheroes

Pirates

Sci-Fi

Coffee Shop

I could have just written a short piece for different AU ideas. Easily. But, as I was looking at these, I started thinking it would be fun to make a connective story, one that starts basically in media res, a mishap already happened.

And I've always been a fan of world-hopping stories. Sliders. Magic: the Gathering. The parts of Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madnes that don't mishandle Wanda or hand the idiot ball off to the smartest man in the world. Heck, Fluppy Dogs probably started it. Give me a situation where people end up in a world other than their own, and in the process of trying to get back home end up in other worlds too. Or just have the means to traverse through several. Not just an isekai (though those are good too), but honest-to-goodness multi-world travel.

So that's what I did.

Presenting:

A Hop, Skip, and a Portal

(More below the cut, because the story is 14k and I'm yapping about all eight parts but I'm also going to try not to be TOO wordy.)

1: Classic

"Bad news." Sonic looked up from rubbing at his aching calves as Sally pushed back through the underbrush, her eyes fixated on Nicole. The soft glow of the small screen outlined her fur in the dark, the unhappy twist of her lips and the furrow in her brow. “Like, out-of-chili-dogs bad or stuck-in-the-roboticizer bad?” Sally glanced up at him, but the furrow only deepened. “Like we-aren’t-even-on-the-same-continent-anymore bad.” Rotor’s prototype device spat and fizzled on the grass beside Sonic as if to punctuate the statement.

Starting right off with the inciting incident having already happened. We know there's a problem, there's some sort of prototype, and they "aren't even on the same continent anymore." We also learn a few other things:

for those not in the know already, Sonic can run across water (he says he doesn't fancy running across an ocean today)

the prototype overheated and singed Sonic's leg, where it was strapped for use

related to the previous, like a certain time-traveling DeLorean, the device requires Sonic-level speeds to activate

This section also introduces a delaying tactic in that the prototype needs to recharge before it can be used again. This is, as expected, simply an authorial excuse to have them explore a bit before they can leave, because what's the fun in world-hopping stories if they don't check out the new places a little bit, and maybe run into some trouble they have to survive and/or deal with before they can go?

Because of course it would be a factory. Sonic couldn’t get away from factories even when testing out travel prototypes for Rotor. And not just any factory either, but a hostile one filled with traps and twisted architecture and random spikes and hostile robots, because of course robots, and the grinning face logo—complete with absurd mustache—plastered everywhere left no room for doubt who could be behind it. Though, Sonic had to admit, the bug-and-seafood theme was new. And for some reason, small animals popped out of them when he cracked them open.

So, default setting for the Sonic/Sally pairing is the Saturday morning cartoon ("SatAM" in the fandom), and by extension the Archie Sonic comics that spawned from the same source as the show. This is the first inkling that it isn't that setting. Sonic's and Sally's Robotnik turns people into robots, rather than putting small animals inside themed robots.

But Robotnik/Eggman in the classic games? Puts animals inside his badniks (which are often bug- or sea-creature-themed).

The smoke and sparks cleared and the little birds and rabbits all hopped away, leaving Sonic standing amid the metal and plastic debris, rubbing a finger under his nose and smirking. “Wasted.” He turned to face the Mobians he’d rescued, a grin on his face. “Happy to help, guys. Just tell ‘em Son—” “You again?” Sonic blinked at the Mobian squirrel who’d shouted. “What d’you mean ‘again’?”

Sonic busts up some badniks to save a few Mobians (animal-people like him and Sally, a term from the aforementioned comics), only for one squirrel to recognize him.

And this is where I got a bit self-indulgent on the story, because I wrote a novelization of the first Sonic game, and this is a direct reference to that. This squirrel is that story's Sally's older brother, and has already had an encounter with that story's Sonic.

“Bad news” was the understatement of the century.

The last section reflects the first by calling back to the "bad news" that the story starts with. Sonic and Sally realize—after seeing a Robotnik that is decidedly not the one they know, as well as seeing this world's version of Sonic and Sally—that the prototype device took them to a new dimension, rather than a new continent. It sets up that they have to blindly use the device again, and hope that it can get them home.

2: Fantasy

“Well.” Sally stared out at the verdant, rolling hills that surrounded her and Sonic, at the copses of trees that broke up the horizon line and crowded around massive outcroppings of monolithic stone, at the rustic cottages interspersed among neatly-tended fields. At, briefly, the deep furrow Sonic had plowed into the soil with his face as they’d crashed through the portal, thanks to twisting to keep Sally from taking the brunt of the fall. And, most importantly, at the tall, imposing castle that crowned one particularly high hill in the far distance. Old architecture. Very old. The kind of old Mobotropolis hadn’t seen in at least a century. “Unless the device can also travel in time,” she said with a sigh, “it’s not just one door.” Sonic grumbled something from where he still lay face-planted in the dirt, raising one hand in a weak but honest thumbs-up.

I still like this opening section for the image of how Sonic landed.

This also introduces the fact that each chapter of the fic switches POV character. The first prompt was from Sonic's POV. This is Sally's, and the third prompt will switch back to Sonic, and so on to the end of the week.

Another thing this section presents is the complication that, while Nicole (Sally's pocket computer) can collect data on their jumps and calculate a target, she needs a wired connection to input the coordinates.

And they've landed in a world with no tech.

“This doesn’t look ‘all quiet-like’!” Sally shouted over the rush of wind in her ears and Sonic’s loud, whooping laughter, as they bolted through the shady paths and gullies of a lush forest. Sparkles of light from bioluminescent plant-life streaked past them, flowers bending and branches rattling in the wake of Sonic’s headlong sprint. “Well I wasn’t exactly expecting Sir Glowy back there to start chasing us, y’know!” he shouted back, turning to run backward long enough to blow a raspberry at the knight pursuing them. The knight—a white hedgehog in archaic-looking armor who could apparently fly via some kind of magic—flung a hand in their direction. A glowing bolt of cyan light burst against a nearby tree trunk, leaving an arrowhead-shaped blade buried halfway into the wood. “Release the Lady Guinevere at once, foul knave, and return to answer for thy trespass!” the knight shouted, and gestured again.

(This section is slightly edited.)

Three things here. First, for context, they went looking for food, and Sonic promised he "can do all quiet-like" and not draw attention to himself.

Second, the character here should be recognizable to most Sonic fans as Silver the Hedgehog, who has psychokinetic powers.

But third, the setting would hopefully be recognizable as that of Sonic and the Black Knight, one of the storybook games, which is based off of Arthurian legend. (Which makes Silver actually Sir Galahad, but that's beside the point.)

Because yes, if a setting already exists for something like it in the Sonic franchise, I'm probably going to lean that way first.

Galahad here mistakes Sally for Guinevere (not actually in the games, but I'd have her played by Sally if she was), and later in the section accuses Sonic of "impersonating His Majesty the king" (because in the game Sonic is identified as their "King Arthur").

Also, thank you for various sources that have gotten me pretty used to Early Modern English (because if there's one thing that really bugs me in fiction, it's getting that grammar wrong).

3: Noir

“It’s just a shirt, Sonic.” “With a noose at the top!”

Sonic does not wear clothes, canonically (beyond gloves and shoes). I can't imagine he'd particularly enjoy being made to wear a shirt.

“Now now, doll, I thought we told ya to lay low for a while,” the figure growled, voice gravelly. Sally shrank into the seat cushions. “Sorry, do I—” “Not so loud now. Don’t want to be heard, ya know.” The figure slid onto the seat beside Sally. “Never know who’s watching.” He tipped his hat up, and the light fell across a long, scaly snout and a sly, toothy grin. An alligator. Or maybe a crocodile. Sonic could never tell. “And maybe tell yer muscle to cool it with the prickles.” Sonic could feel his quills poke through his borrowed clothing. They probably left holes behind. Served the shirt right for being so confining. The crocodile (alligator?) winked. “Unless yer looking for a dustup or something, bub.”

So, full disclosure: I've never really read or watched noir stuff before, let alone tried to write it. I had a vague idea of vibes, and found a couple slang dictionaries online for noir stories, and winged it.

Also, our character cameos for this prompt were the Chaotix Detective Agency, because they totally fit a noir setting (this crocodile is Vector, the head of the agency), and later, the games' Modern Eggman with his robot lackeys Orbot and Cubot and his AI "daughter" Sage.

The crocodile just stared at her for a long moment, one eye squinted as he really examined her features. Finally, he huffed. “Yer not Miss Acorn, are ya? She didn’t tell me she was twins.”

I'm inclined to believe, based on a few things in the games, that Vector is actually at least halfway decent at being a detective. So he gets to realize that our Sally is not the Sally that hired him. And then (because he doesn't know about world-hopping), he assumes she's her sister instead.

4: Horror

Okay, I may not be that familiar with noir, but horror? Now we're talking. Especially when my husband (who also loves certain kinds of horror) helps me brainstorm.

Sally cut off the hapless hedgehog before he could give away their hiding place, hand clapped over his mouth, and ignored her double giving her the stink-eye from his other side. The creatures that hunted them were still out there, and she didn’t know how good their senses were. Could they see them through walls? Hear their heartbeats? Smell the tang of fear on their fur?

Nothing like starting off another prompt in media res, only now we're smack dab in the middle of a dangerous situation, and Sally is stuck without Sonic, but with her and Sonic's doubles, revealed a couple paragraphs later as the "Harkers." Which should give an idea of what kind of horror (and what kind of "creatures") this story is.

The noise had drawn the attention of things that had looked Mobian at first, until the claws and wings and teeth came out, and in their mad run through the mansion to try to find safe harbor, Sonic and Sally had been separated.

And then a shadow dropped down from above, and crashed through the glass with an ear-splitting shriek. Sally caught a glimpse of white fangs and the monstrous flash of fire in its glassy eyes, moonlight on clawed fists and wild red quills. Echidna. She didn’t wait for it to pounce.

She’d found Sonic. Well, actually, the creatures that lived in the chateau had found him first. The fireplace had been lit, and the deceptively warm glow outlined Sonic where he lay on the dining table. He struggled against the grip of one of the creatures, a black hedgehog with red stripes and a large pair of bony, ragged wings, who pinned him down by his wrists, face frozen in a blank, uncaring expression. It didn’t even look up at Sally and the Harkers, fixated on keeping Sonic in place for.... Well, for the one Sally assumed was the ringleader. A white bat, fur neatly curled and pressed into shape, blood red gown hugging her curves. She smiled at Sally, fangs glinting in the firelight.

A few samples. I managed to go this whole section without ever once using the word "vampire."

Also, our guest characters for this section: Knuckles the Echidna, Shadow the Hedgehog, and Rouge the Bat.

Once I'd settled on "vampire horror," I couldn't not use Rouge, and go for "let's gender-flip all the roles." So Rouge is our Dracula, Shadow and Knuckles are two of her "vampire husbands," and while the Harkers are still sporting the names Jonathan for Sonic and Mina for Sally, she gets to be Jonathan and Van Helsing rolled into one while Jonathan/Sonic gets to be the one our Dracula is seeking to claim.

“I don’t think you get a say in this,” the bat said, gently tilted Sonic’s face up to expose his neck, and sank her fangs in deep. Sonic’s yelp of pain died quickly, sinking into something softer, weaker, more vulnerable. A soft moan that clutched at Sally’s heart. His legs kicked feebly against the table, sneakered heels thumping on the wood, but it was like the creature’s bite drew more than just blood from him. It sapped his will to fight.

Okay, let's hurt the characters I love, just a little bit. As a treat.

Don't worry, they escape, but Sonic's been weakened.

5: Superheroes

But no, his first outing after two and a half days of enforced bed rest by Sally, and he already had people once again trying to punch his face in or trap him and do Chaos-knew-what-but-it-probably-wasn’t-good to him. Oh, probably not bite his neck and drain his blood this time, but still. The pink one could hit like a truck—he’d been hit by enough trucks in his life to know the feeling—and the green one had all sorts of gadgets on him that looked just as nasty as half the things Robotnik had thrown at him, and probably stung twice as much. And for some reason they thought he was their brother.

Sonic's had some time to rest, but isn't fully recovered from a vampire bite yet.

Also, our guest characters this time around are a pair of hedgehogs I love in concept, even though I've never watched their show: Sonia and Manic, from Sonic Underground, Sonic's triplet siblings (but only in that universe; he's an only child in most other settings).

And I decided to make them villains.

He slid down a slanted glass roof on another building and zipped around a giant bronze planet labeled “The Globe” before skidding between a pair of light-up billboards advertising some kind of shaving product and a movie starring little pudding things with eyes.

The mention of "The Globe" here might give a hint as to what I'm drawing on for this story.

Meanwhile, the "movie starring little pudding things with eyes" is a reference to the Chao in Space series of in-universe movies that get movie posters in some of the games.

A red-headed squirrel ran up, and it said something about how much he’d been adjusting to this world-hopping that he didn’t even do a double-take at the sight of this world’s Sally Acorn, even if her tail was a lot longer and she was wearing more clothing—again with the clothing!—than usual. He did do a double-take at her camera-toting companion, though, but managed not to sputter out a surprised “Tails!” at the sight of the two-tailed fox. Not my Tails, not my Tails.

And if the "Globe" wasn't a hint enough, this section and the following paragraphs should be clue enough: this is a Superman reference. Tails gets to be Jimmy Olsen, while Sally is Lois Lane, though sporting her own name (and a longer tail) because in the Fleetway comics, Sally Acorn was a news reporter (and a squirrel rather than a chipmunk).

And yes, the alternate Sonic is Clark Kent:

“That was pretty cool,” a new voice said beside him, and Sonic nearly jumped out of his quills. He turned to see who had managed to sneak up on him and— Oh. His double. But...brown? And fidgeting with some kind of techy wrist cuff. Sonic eyed it, then glanced back up into his double’s boring black eyes. “Neat trick.” “Not like there are a lot of blue hedgehogs in this city.” His double also wore a white button shirt and slacks, and glasses, even though Sonic had gathered that the dress code in this dimension was clothing-optional, at least for Mobians.

Going by the name "Nick" as a reference to the manga, where Sonic is the superpowered alter-ego of a hedgehog kid named "Nicky," and brown because of the versions of Sonic's origin story that have him brown before an accident turns him blue and gives him superspeed. I'm just full of references in this section.

6: Pirates

“My apologies, Sally. My cal-cal-calculations were off.” Sally sighed and shielded her eyes from the sun, and stared out at the crisp, sparkling horizon line that surrounded them. Literally surrounded them. “It’s fine,” she reassured Nicole. “We’ll figure this out. Just...take it easy for a bit.” Nicole beeped in response, and Sally clipped the computer back to her boot and stared out again at the emptiness as though a solution would materialize. The ocean just stared back. Sonic groaned from behind her, leaning against the lone palm tree on the small jut of land that one might charitably call an “island,” if they could ignore that it was barely ten paces across. And sported another of Sonic’s impact craters in the side of the very short cliff, where Sonic had crashed after the portal had opened up and spat them out onto open ocean. He’d been lucky enough to be running fast enough to maintain purchase against the water’s surface tension, but that hadn’t helped Sally when Sonic had needed to make a choice between crashing with her in his arms or tossing her into the water to spare her potential contusions and broken bones. Her fur and vest would dry out. Nicole, on the other hand, while mostly shielded against water damage, had been dunked longer than ideal, and her sputtering audio had Sally worried that saltwater had gotten in somewhere it shouldn’t. And if there was an electronics shop in all this endless blue, Sally would eat her boots. Which meant no opportunity for repairs in this dimension.

Nicole had coordinates by the end of prompt five, but there are eight prompts to the week. So. Miscalculated a jump, that ended up with them on a tiny island in the middle of an ocean.

I couldn't not have Sonic crash-land again. It's too fun having him faceplant his landings (which is also fairly canon).

And then the small craft pulled up alongside the ship again, and Sally caught sight of the rest of the crew. A large purple cat. A pink hedgehog. A duplicate of Tails who looked a little older than the one she knew. A white bat and a red echidna. And her without wooden stakes. “Well, well, well,” the echidna drawled, showing off a hint of gold fang—normal animal fangs, thankfully, not monster fangs—tilting his black captain’s hat down over one eye so that his leer became more menacing. “If it don’t be our wayward crewman and his lady siren. With legs now!”

They're rescued by pirates, and here's where I get to make it clear just what setting we're using for "Pirates," because the Sonic Prime show had a pirate setting. And, because I'd already used Knuckles and Rouge in the horror section, I got to call back to that by having Sally recognize the pirate captain and one of his crew.

I also got to have Knuckles the Dread hint at what this world's version of Sonic and Sally are, because they don't make an appearance in this story.

“Fine. Maybe a stint in the drink will loosen yer tongue.” Dread gestured impatiently, and the purple cat pushed Sonic off of the plank. Sally flinched when Sonic’s surprised yelp was cut off by a loud splash. Dread turned toward the rest of the crew. “Sails, give that lubber time enough to rethink his choices, then drag him out afore he drowns.” The Tails duplicate saluted, and flew over to the railing to keep an eye out...then looked uncertainly back at Dread. “Uh, Cap’n?” “...Aye?” “You want me to keep him from drowning, aye?” “Aye.” A sassy voice Sally knew all too well floated up from below the plank. “Then maybe you should make sure your prisoners can’t swim!”

Fun fact: there are, I believe, exactly two Sonic media where Sonic can swim. SatAM is one of them. Sonic Prime is not. I do enjoy playing with that when I can.

7: Sci-Fi

Sonic shrugged. “Too clean to be one of Buttnik’s factories. And there’s”—he tapped his toe against the floor for emphasis—“a hum under the floor. Engine?” “Some kind of ship then.”

As one of my commenters asked, "How do you do 'sci-fi' in a setting that's already sci-fi?" You take an episode from Sonic X, that's how. This is from the third season, which got a bit more sci-fi than the first two seasons. Specifically episode 3x21, when Shadow raids Team Sonic's spaceship to take out one of their teammates because of plot reasons.

But it was Tails, or whatever this dimension’s Tails called himself, shielding a small green girl with flower buds in her hair in the doorway of one of the rooms. Sure, maybe a little taller, a little older-looking and -sounding, but the two tails were still there.

This Tails is actually two years younger than the SatAM Tails, but he's portrayed as a lot smarter, an inventor (he built the spaceship they're on) and kid genius, while SatAM Tails didn't get to be that because that characterization hadn't been added to the games when SatAM was made.

“Shadow’s trying to hurt Cosmo.” Tails started pulling them along again. “We need to get her somewhere safe, and figure out how to get him back off of the Blue Typhoon.” “The Blue—” “My ship? You remember, right?” Tails lurched to an abrupt stop and squinted at both of them. “Wait, you’re not—huh. Dimensional travel?” “Er, yes.” Sally sounded just as off-kilter. “Well. I won’t say no to another Sonic’s help.” Tails started forward again. “Just like that, huh?” “Eh, wouldn’t be the first time we had a dimensional mishap.”

(slightly edited)

Like I said, Shadow attacking one of Team Sonic's teammates.

Also, I decided that this Tails would roll with the idea of dimensional travel (Nick from "Superheroes" probably would too, actually) because he's smart, and also because the first two seasons of the show hinged around all of Team Sonic, Eggman, and a few other people ending up in a dimensional accident that transported them to Earth from their world. So it's, like, Tuesday for them.

The black-and-red hedgehog glared at him. “Out of my way, Sonic.” “Well, at least you know my name this time.” He waggled a finger at the hedgehog—Tails had called the guy “Shadow,” right?—and tutted. “No biting, okay?”

Something—or someone—else had slowed Shadow down, and it didn’t take long to find out who as he came to another junction in the corridors and found Shadow dodging rapid-fire blows from a red Mobian that also had Sonic briefly flinching and biting down a yelp at the memory of being hunted. An echidna. Though this time he seemed to be on their side instead of a monster, so Sonic could allow himself a little bit of relief. Maybe. Once he convinced his overactive panic drive to stop firing.

And then a white bat dropped down from a vent in the ceiling between them, and Sonic did yelp and stumble and just barely twist in a dodge around her without touching her at all. She looked startled at his reaction as he speed-hopped on one foot to keep from falling over, held up both hands in a warding gesture, and yelled, “No! Bad! Definitely no biting!” before sprinting after Shadow again.

Fun with callbacks, because Shadow, Knuckles, and Rouge are all in this setting (and this episode) too, and this time, we're in Sonic's POV.

He thumbed at the communicator as he struggled back to his feet. “Sal, we got a problem.” “How much of a problem are we talking?” She sounded like she was talking around something held between her teeth. “Shadow has Rotor’s device.” He took off through the exit Shadow had taken. “You need to get the device back,” Sally said, urgent and not a little scared-sounding. “Because if it finishes recharging while he still has it....”

“You’ve only got minutes by Nicole’s calculation,” Sally’s voice crackled over the comms. “Something Shadow’s doing is charging it faster.”

Extra drama for this chapter: unlike most people who might steal the device, Shadow is actually fast enough to activate it if it recharges, and because he gives off Chaos Energy naturally (or so I headcanon, when he's using his various abilities), it's actually charging the device up faster than normal. So if Sonic doesn't get the device away in time, Shadow will end up dimension-hopping and Sonic and Sally will be stranded.

Because who doesn't love a good "stranded" element in a dimension-hopping story?

8: Coffee Shop

“I should probably let Tails do more.” Sonic looked up from where he sprawled across the surprisingly comfortable upholstered bench. “Mm-hmm?” Sally poked at the components she had scattered across the table in front of her, carefully selecting wires and chips to clip together and occasionally pausing to take sips from the paper cup beside her. Fine, loopy script read “Sally” in black marker on the side. The drink was bitter but not entirely unpleasant, especially with the cream and sugar the barista had suggested, and she found it soothing in a way she couldn’t really describe.

I love a prompt list that just hands me a good wind-down at the end. Here, we have Sally musing about letting their Tails do more (because Game Tails got to do more as time went on, and presumably SatAM Tails has that potential). Also describing coffee for a character who comes from a world that may or may not have it, but she's never drunk it (because they've spent ten-plus years fighting a worldwide takeover by Robotnik).

The bell over the door chimed. Sally glanced up to see a blue hedgehog trot into the café, and couldn’t hide her smile. Because of course it wouldn’t take long for this world’s Sonic to show up. This one seemed younger. Had blue arms, which was a little strange, and his eyes were set a bit differently in his face, but the cheerful attitude was unmistakable as he waved at the barista and hopped up onto a stool at the counter. “Yo, Stone!” The barista sighed. “Sonic.”

“Sonic, your order,” the barista called. “Right! See you around!” Sonic dashed up to the counter to grab his food, and then back out the door, leaving a trail of blue light and a hollered, “Bye Stone! Bye Robotnik!” in his wake. “Yeah,” Sonic grumbled, “Not getting used to that one.”

Okay, but what if I decided that the coffee shop setting was the Mean Bean Coffee Café from the Sonic movies, but in an alternate universe where Stone and Robotnik just...run the coffee shop instead of megalomaniacal villain schemes?

And oof, that's everything. Whole lotta words, in a fandom most of my mutuals don't follow, so I fully understand if no one wants to scroll through this (but I still had fun talking about some of the inspirations).

Tag list, though it's not Tuesday anymore, but you can still Tell Me if you want (or wait until next Tuesday):

@mama-qwerty, @jadeandroses, @handsignals, @himluv, @sorcerousadventurer, @dags-over-caravans, @chaosherald, @serialsforbellara, @necromanticsoul, @sandcastlekings, @redheadsramblings, @sapphireangelbunny, @genjyoandgojyoandhakkai, @wolfsong-the-bloody-beast, @hedwigoprah, @redaresss, @mushrooms-x-moss, @grand-crow, @davrinsleftpectoral, @blackwall-my-tiny-husband, @pixiedurango, @jukkaricity, @ladyofcrowsandcoffee, @lycheecatee, @the-archons-moustache, @rooks-dagger, @maagisterpavus, @dell-amor-te, @hibiscus-wo-tabeta, @reaver-of-kirkwall, @woundedsoul12, @shadrachanki

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