Heavy Metal + Super Speed comes out to Way Past Cool

DISCLAIMER: All...You know what? Screw it, you know the drill.

(Thanks, Craine, for that style.)

PRELIMINARY NOTE: OK, a few things I need to make clear here. This is, basically,
an unauthorized combination of "Sonic Underground", "SatAM", & ArtFanWriter3's "Sonic
Meets Metallica", but with my own little twists & turns. I have, like ArtFanWriter3, made a
few changes in the band's history, but not in the albums released. Every album they have
released thus far will be represented at least once in this story, except for Garage, Inc. Oh, &
1 more thing: In this story, Cliff Burton never died. That's right; in this story, Clifford Lee Burton
is alive & well, & he is kicking some serious ass. Not to mention the fact that he's been with
Metallica throughout every year they've been active, from Kill 'Em All right up through to the
present, including Death Magnetic. But enough rambling from me-let's do this thing!

The Mojave Desert was a barren, empty place. Scorching hot, too, especially in the summertime. There were very few roads traveling through it. Occupying 1 of those roads, heading northward, was a jet-black charter bus, long & tall. Silvery letters running along the sides spelled out a very familiar name to almost anyone: Metallica.

Within the cooled confines of said bus, somewhere towards the middle, lead vocalist/rhythm guitarist/band co-founder James Hetfield was just sitting in a plushy chair reading a newspaper, or, more specifically, the music section, & he was very pleased at what he was reading: Their latest album, Death Magnetic, had debuted at number 1 on the U.S. Billboard 200, selling almost half a million copies in its first 3 days on the shelves. Still, even receiving good news got boring after a while. Bob Seger had not been lying when he said there wasn't much to do when one had been riding for 16 hours.

"Reading the paper again, James?" asked James' close friend & bandmate, bassist/background vocalist Cliff Burton. James rolled his eyes.

"It's better than being tossed out a window--" James started to retort.

"--& having a bus completely crush you. Don't remind me," finished Cliff with a shiver. Back in 1986, the band had been traveling on a road between Stockholm & Copenhagen when the bus they had been using at the time (allegedly, though no one in the band believed it) skidded on some black ice, flipped over several times, & eventually came to a stop on its side at the bottom of a small hill. The memory still caused extreme chills, especially for Cliff, because at some point during all that, he had gotten tossed out a window, & the bus had actually landed on him. Miraculously, he had survived & fully recovered (there had been a 1-in-millions chance that that would happen, according to doctors, but Cliff was always 1 for beating the odds), but it gave the band chills to think about what might have happened if he hadn't lived.

"Hey, let's go see what the other 2 are doing," suggested Cliff.

"Sure, why not?" agreed James, & followed Cliff to the back of the bus. Once there, they found drummer & band co-founder Lars Ulrich sleeping on the couch, obviously dreaming, the way he was tossing about. A short distance to James' left was a wooden rocking chair occupied by lead guitarist Kirk Hammett. He was staring in the direction of the TV, which was showcasing a children's cartoon that James immediately recognized, due to the blue hedgehog-type critter that took up half the screen.

"Hey, isn't that Sonic the Hedgehog there?" asked James.

"Yes, indeedy. That's the original Saturday morning cartoon," replied Kirk.

"Are you seriously that bored?" asked Cliff.

"Actually, it's pretty entertaining. My oldest son got me into it a couple of months back," answered Kirk, at which point Sonic leapt onto the screen & let out an insane lick out of his guitar.

"Hey, Kirk, I think Sonic plays better than you," joked James.

"Fuck that, man. If he was real, I'd burn him quicker than a damn piece of grass," Kirk replied, with a raised eyebrow.

James, Cliff, & Kirk all chuckled to themselves, at which point they heard a voice coming from James' right:

"Wasn't there another one of those things, um, Sonic Underground, I think it was?"

James, Kirk, & Cliff whipped around. Lars had woken up & was looking right at Kirk, who answered.

"That's it exactly. That one actually had a pretty good band going."

"Can you imagine if we got to, like, jam with those guys?" asked Lars.

"Yeah, really," chuckled Cliff. "The Freedom Fighters & Metallica, Live for 1 Weekend Only at the TD Banknorth Garden!" Everybody laughed at that. But extremely deep down inside, they were all thinking about it. If it was possible for Cliff to fully recover from an accident that would kill just about anyone else, was it also possible to find a way to jam with Sonic the Hedgehog & company?

A/N: OK, this is my first multi-chaptered story in a long time. Let's hope I don't fuck it up. Let's also hope I don't find ArtFanWriter3 on my ass tomorrow morning. Granted, the idea was somewhat stolen, but I'm attempting to use it as a way to pay tribute to him. Go read his "Sonic Meets Metallica"! It's, like, 10x better than this!

Next: We check up on the Freedom Fighters; specifically, Sonic, Tails, & Sally.