When You Roll Around At The Speed Of Sound
Sonic the Hedgehog. The Blue Blur. The fastest thing alive. A true hero of his time, the famous blue hedgehog had been known throughout the world as the king of speed. His quick feet and quick wit had stopped the end of the world innumerable times in the past, and there were only a handful of people that hadn't heard of his name. Sonic and, to a lesser extent, his friends were beloved by many. Yet despite his fame, no one, not even his best friend Tails, knew why Sonic loved to run so fast. That was Tails' mission today: to discover why Sonic ran so much. He had asked many times in the past, but either circumstances had cut off their conversation or Sonic had changed the subject.
"No more," Tails told himself firmly. "After all these years I'm finally going to know."
Sonic had agreed to lunch with Tails sometime around noon. Tails had arrived there around 11:55 am, and Sonic, as usual, arrived at 12:15 pm, fifteen minutes late.
"Hey Tails!" Sonic greeted his pal with the same energy he did everything. "Sorry for being late, I got caught up talking to Shadow earlier!"
Tails nodded his head. "What were you two talking about?"
Sonic shrugged his shoulders. "Stuff. Hey, are those chili dogs?"
Tails nodded, smirking at his friends' predictable behavior. Tails had already ordered the food for both of them since he knew what Sonic always got: chili dogs. "You know, Sonic, those things are awful for your health." Tails noted in passing.
"Who cares, chili dogs keep me from cutting!" Sonic exclaimed as though he was talking about the weather. Tails blinked. He couldn't of heard that correctly. He thought about asking Sonic to repeat what he'd just said, but Sonic never repeated anything. Besides, Tails had probably just misheard a funny joke or something.
"Right, so anyways, I wanted to ask you something," Tails stated, ready to confront his friend for the truth no matter how many chili dogs it would cost.
"Shoot, Tails," Sonic replied, making a small gun with his fingers and pointing it at Tails.
"I need you to give me an honest answer this time, no changing the subject or any other crap. Why do you run so fast?"
"Pfft, is that all?" Sonic mocked lightheartedly. "I move my feet really fast and-"
"No, Sonic, that's not what I mean," Tails cut him off soberly. "Why do you run fast? Why do you do it?"
Sonic chuckled softly. "Well that's simple. When you roll around at the speed of sound, no one can hear you scream in existential terror."
Tails stared back at his friend's casual grin, completely dumbfounded. "Wait, wha-"
"Gotta go fast to escape the past!" Sonic exclaimed.
Before Tails could react, a sonic boom loud enough that Tails felt it more than he heard it overpowered him. It took a few seconds for his senses to realize that Sonic had just ran out of the diner and into the nearby plain. Tails rushed after him, confusion and concern filling throughout his body. It took him several minutes to catch up to his speeding friend, and by then they were rushing across the ocean at insane speeds.
"Sonic!" Tails yelled, trying to get his voice heard over the roaring wind. "Sonic! What's wrong?"
Sonic ignored his best pal. The wind made it easy to mute him out. The wind did not, however, make it any easier to mute out the images and sounds that were seared into his senses. Thousands of pictures all tried to force their way into his focus. Horrifying pictures of himself and his friends in disgusting circumstances. Mounds and mounds of pornography of himself with everyone he knew in what seemed to be millions of different kinks and scenarios. Vore, incest, furries, rivers of cum, DDLG, BDSM, three-ways, four-ways, twenty-ways, all fought to be the center of attention in his mind. Every time he tried to think of something else, anything else, another picture of insanity would overcome him. All while he was fighting out the images in a losing battle, rock bands all sang about him simultaneously. The din created tore away from his ability to try to stop the visions and more and more came. Tears started to well up in his eyes but he kept a smile on his face. Smiles were for happy people, and Sonic wanted to be happy. Somehow the smile didn't feel right, so he made it larger. He looked back to Tails, whose face drained of color upon seeing Sonic's.
"You're too SLOW!" Sonic yelled, increasing his pace to Mach 2.
Tails quickly fell behind and became unable to keep up with his friend. Sonic raced across the water, trying to think of any way to brighten his day. A lightbulb went off in the darkness of his mind, and he rushed off to his left.
Two hours later, Sonic arrived at his rivals' base. He zoomed over the defenses and found Dr. Eggman doing Sudoku in his pajamas.
"Sonic?" Dr. Eggman asked, startled. "What gives? I haven't done anything yet."
"Don't try to fool me, Egg head! I know you're up to something! Spill the beans!"
"No, seriously," Eggman replied, baffled. "I've been busy catching up on my T. V. shows."
Sonic pulled out a .44 mm hand cannon with the name "Shadow the Hedgehog" written on it. He cocked it and pointed it at the fat, balding man in front of him. "Last chance!"
"Holy shit, Sonic, I swear to God I-"
Eggman's pleas were cut off by two large bangs that came from Sonic's weapon. The hand cannon had destroyed to poor professors head and the blood splatters it created on the wall and floor were not small.
"I guess you were just too slow, Egg head!" Sonic joked, wishing that his pain would end. His plan had failed, he couldn't get the insanity to stop. He needed to find someone else to blame, but Shadow's corpse was already rotting where he had left it.
"Well, shoot," Sonic exhaled, looking down at the gun with resignation. "I guess that's exactly what I'll have to do!"
Before he could end his misery, Tails burst through the door. He was panting and sweating, his eyes enormous as he looked at the gun in Sonics hand. He looked over to the mess in front of Sonic and almost threw up. "Holy shit!" He exclaimed, taken aback. "Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit!"
"He had it coming! Sonic said cheerfully, the same way he said everything.
Tails looked in horror at his best friend. "What the hell, Sonic? What's wrong with you? What have you done?"
Sonic shrugged in apathy. "Like I said, he had it coming! He refused to tell me the truth, and now he's dead."
"Sonic, this isn't right!"
"Neither is my life Tails!" Sonic replied gleefully, his smile stretching across his face. "The visions, Tails, the visions! Running at the speed of light has surrounded me in darkness! This is my only hope!"
Tears fell from Tails' face. "Please, Sonic, don't!"
Sonic laughed hard. The sounds and visions became distorted, screams of agony could be heard everywhere. "Sorry Tails, but I guess you were just too slow!"
Shots rang out through the building as the blue blur stopped.