"I can't believe we're doing this shit" Danny muttered as Arin prepared everything for their April Fool's Day Special. "Me neither dude" Arin replied with a sigh "I can't wait to see everyone shit their pants" Arin added with a chuckle. Arin was feeling a little nervous. How long had it been? Almost 3 years. And it was finally going to happen. "let's just boot up the ole' PlayStation 3" Arin said as he performed the aforementioned action. Danny fumbled with the mics and made sure everything was good to go. Arin grabbed the game case with ample apprehension. Deep in his heart he felt something wrong about this. That it wouldn't be the same. Despite the persistent tingling of his danger-senses he knew the Lovelies would love this. It would cause a mighty (and hopefully not too destructive) uproar.
He looked at the case finding comfort in the determined blue eyes of the speedy hedgehog on the cover. He popped the disc in. He glanced at Dan; who also seemed to be a bit nervous. It was understandable, what they were doing was a sin against the Game Grumps foundations. Picking up a series that was cherished with another man, another not-so-grump, was sacrilegious. While the intentions may be pure the two lets players were treading in immoral and unholy territory.
Arin grabbed his controller and sat beside Dan, as a wave of nostalgia rushed over him. "Are you ready?" Arin asked his voice unsure. "Yup, you?" Dan responded equally as apprehensive. "Ready as I'll ever be." Arin said trying to play off how wrong this felt. The Sonic 06 title screen flashed across the TV. "Welp, here we go." Arin said composing himself, "Dan, what game is this? I… I feel like I've seen this title screen before" Arin asked with exaggerated fear. "I don't dude, but it looks like a really great game. I'm sure it won't be a total piece of shit!" Dan remarked. Arin chuckled "Well, we will see about that. Anyway, long overdue and long requested we have" he paused for dramatic effect "SONIC 06!" Arin shouted. "OH SHITTTT!" Dan yelled with a mix of real and fake terror. Arin selected the old save file, "let's get this shit show on the road" but before the shit show could begin the screen turned black.
"What the fuck?" Arin asked confused. Arin's danger-senses were tingling with all the might of a thousand danger centipedes. "That's weird. Is everything connected right?" Dan asked equally as confused. Suddenly, the screen flashed back to the menu. "OK we're back!" Dan said "the PlayStation just fucked up a little but everything's fine now" He continued. "Everything's not fine!" a familiar voice said coming from the TV. The lights began to flicker in the Grump Space. The air seemed electrified and the hair on the back of Arin and Dan's necks began to stand on end. "what the hell?" Arin muttered feeling scared now. "Arin! I need your help!" the voice said. Just then, the gorgeous blue form of Sonic appeared on the screen. Arin and Danny were dumb struck. "what… what do you need me for?" Arin asked softly, his heart pounding. "No time to explain!" Sonic said as he reached out of the screen and grabbed Arin's arm. "But! Wait! What on earth is going on?!" Arin asked flustered, pink dusting his cheeks. "Come on! Gotta go fast!" Sonic said desperation filling his too cool voice as he fastly pulled Arin into the screen.
As soon as Arin went through the screen the PlayStation short circuited. The lights stopped flickering, and everything was in a hazy calm. Danny sat confused, awestruck. He couldn't process what had just happened. The door of the room opened. Barry peeked his head in to see if they were recording. Danny sat unmoving on the couch. "Hey everything OK in here? I have no idea what's going on" Barry trailed off. He looked around confused. "Where's Arin?" he asked. Dan made an unintelligible grunt and then muttered "I knew this was a bad idea". Barry walked over to Danny, "hey what's going on? Is everything OK?" he asked growing more and more concerned. "Sonic the Hedgehog" Danny took a moment to cherish just how batshit crazy this all was "fucking Sonic took Arin" Dan said fear and confusion making his voice shaky. Barry sighed, taking in the situation. "I knew this day would come." He looked at Danny's frightened, pallid face. "Don't worry we can get Arin back, we just need to summon… HIM" Barry's tone was serious. He knew they had a long road ahead.
Arin felt the sensation of unadulterated speed as Sonic dragged him across dimensions. It was just… so fast. Arin liked it though, the speed was so intoxicating. Despite having many times displaying hatred and disgust for Sonic games he secretly liked Sonic and found his cool-dude personality endearing. The situation, while scaring the shit out of him was appealing. Being with Sonic in the flesh was something Arin had only dreamed of. Arin looked about as the strange lights and shapes of the universe passed by them at sonic speeds. He gripped Sonic tighter, his face growing warm.
Eventually their speedy journey reached its end. They landed in a place all too familiar to Arin. Soleanna. It was much better looking in person than the graphics had conveyed. Arin was a bit winded after going through multiple dimensions. "Here let's take a seat and I can explain all of this to you." Sonic said gesturing to a bench with one of his large gloved hands. They sat down beside each other as Arin tried to catch his breath. "Alright I guess I should start at the beginning," Sonic began, gazing into Arin's beautiful brown eyes. "Everything got kinda thrown out of equilibrium once this game was created. It was a dark time. Never had a sonic game sucked so bad. It was a disgrace." Sonic said emotion filling his normally care-free, and somewhat soulless voice. Arin nodded hanging on the hedgehogs words with great interest. "And now that you were going to finish the play through without… him" Sonic said apprehensively. Arin knew that continuing the play through was sacrilege, tainting both the name of Grumps and the Sonic franchise. "You see, yours and Jon's play through had started to make things better. It helped restore the balance. Because despite how bad this game is you helped people enjoy it. People were smiling and laughing because of your commentary about the game." Sonic said admiration strong in his voice. Arin smiled; he always loved his work and had never thought about Sonic 06 like that. "but now…" Sonic trailed off. "Things are way out of whack. The guardians of the Sonic Universe are displeased. Enraged in fact. So I need you to help me appease them." Sonic finished trying to read Arin's feelings. Arin felt bad for causing all this trouble, but was excited to embark on a quest like this with the hog, the myth, the legend, Sonic.
"You'll help right?" Sonic pleaded. Arin took Sonic's big hands in his smaller ones, "Of course, dude. It's gonna be epic!" Arin said smiling. Sonic let out a hedgehoggy chuckle. "I'm glad." Sonic added squeezing Arin's hands lightly. Sonic couldn't deny his admiration for the human. He knew it was taboo, forbidden even. But his feelings for Arin were strong. His hedgy heart fluttered. Arin's cheeks grew pink as their hand embrace went on longer than acceptable for Bros. "S-so what's first?" Arin asked coyly withdrawing his hands to push his luscious brown locks out of his face. Sonic gave his trademark toothy grin "I'm glad you asked! First we have to defeat Silver, he's glitched out and only he knows how to get to the guardians." Arin's face fell. The suffering of fighting Silver left scars that would never heal. The dick-ish phrase "it's no use" echoed in his mind. Sonic saw the fear in Arin's eyes. "Don't worry Arin, we can do it… together." Sonic said earnestly as he patted Arin's shoulder with his huge hedgehog hand. Arin smiled. "Thanks dude." Arin said trying to hide how much Sonic made his heart pound. It felt so sudden, but so real. It was so different from anything he'd ever felt. "Well, we really should get to it." Sonic said getting up from the bench. "Yeah" Arin said standing up also. Sonic made his way through the many identical alleyways of Soleanna. Arin had to keep speeding up his pace trying to follow the fast blue creature in front of him.
MEANWHILE AT THE GRUMP SPACE
Danny sat on the grump couch waiting for Barry to return. Barry had said that 'to go on such a formidable quest as this, many preparations must be made' and with that Barry had left the grump space. Dan took a deep breath. This is not what I expected today, he thought. He arose from the couch of the grump and paced for a moment. Barry seemed to be prepared for this, Dan thought. I don't understand any of this, he thought. How could this little thing do all that? Dan thought as he examined the PS3. I could remove the disc, he thought, but that might disrupt the magical-mojo. Dan looked around the grump space. It felt exceptionally lonely and empty. The door opened jolting the tall muppet-esque man out of his melancholy musings. Barry sauntered in his arms full of… Taco Bell bags? "This is it? We're going to bring Arin back with bad Mexican food?" Dan asked half joking, half angry. Barry, who Dan hadn't realized was looking extra bad ass in a pair of shades and a leather jacket, looked at Dan with a wise look. "It's a long way to New York City."
