sonic goes to hot topic

chapter 1

Sonic hated the mall. Too bad he worked in the food court. Unfortunately, the local Sonic Drive-In had some kind of beef with hedgehogs, thus refusing to hire them despite anti-discrimination laws. The mall was his last resort. It was the only place that would hire him, and he was going to be evicted if he missed another rent payment. If only gold rings were an accepted form of currency. Too make thing worse, his landlord was a little old Italian lady, and he could just imagine her throwing him out the window, along with the rest of his furniture, while yelling obscenities he couldn't understand. He frequently had dreams about it. Scary.

"Tails," he said. "Don't you ever think there's more to life than taking people's money and giving them hotdogs?" He pronounced "dog" like "dawg."

"No," Tails replied as he took someone's money and gave them a hotdog.

"Oh, okay." Sonic nodded, clearly unfulfilled with his best friend's answer.

He sighed, chin in hand and elbow on the Nathan's Hotdogs counter. He was wistfully thinking about how he could be at home watching Spawn. Wistfully thinking about Michael J. White's hot bod. How he wished it was shown off more in the movie. Mortal Kombat was always a good option too, with Liu Kang's big, beefy arms and all.

"Um, hello?" Tails waved his hand in front of Sonic's face to no avail. He grabbed his friend's shoulders and violently shook him instead. "Earth to Sonic! Earth to Sonic!"

In Sonic's spooked state, his body automatically responded with a hard slap across Tails' face.

"Jesus Christ, man!" Tails said, clearly shocked. He moved a gloved hand to protectively cover his wounded cheek.

"Oh my god!" Sonic exclaimed. "I am so sorry, buddy. Don't startle me like that again!"

"Startle you?" Tails retorted. "I wouldn't have to startle you if you just did your job!"

"I'm taking my break now." Sonic announced flatly.

"What? And just leave me with this?" Tails motioned towards the register, where a lengthy line of inpatient patrons had formed behind the counter.

"You can deal," Sonic snapped. With this, he left the Nathan's Hotdogs and walked past the crowds of people. He made sure to kick a garbage can on the way out, just to make sure people knew what an angsty hedgehog he was. Because he was so angsty, he decided to take a stroll to the newest edition to the mall: Hot Topic. Might as well get yassified with angst. He was a blue man with a plan.

Sonic had spent all of his life running. That's why it felt so nice to just slow down and walk every now and then. One foot after the other, step after step, he kept a slow pace in an attempt to maximize time spent by himself. He looked all around him, taking the sights in. Clothes and cars on display, massage chairs that don't work, kiosks of over priced things that you don't want to buy. The sights combined with the clusters of people became over whelming. Sonic felt his chest getting tighter. It was becoming harder to breath. His heart rate sped up. This is not what he wanted. He wanted to slow down.

He put his hand on his chest and squeezed his eyes shut. Remember what your therapist said, Sonic told himself. He couldn't remember what his therapist had said. Too bad his insurance stopped covering his therapy. Sonic felt an unexpected hand on his shoulder. It was heavy and smooth.

"There you are," the hand's owner said. His voice was robotic but warm, unlike his hand, which was robotic and cold. "Rest easy, superstar."

"You make it sound like like I died," Sonic responded, now picturing himself crudely photoshopped into the clouds. He opened his eyes and turned, finally meeting the stranger's gaze.