The Angel Island Players
Okay, inspiration for this story is from the Avatar: The Last Airbender TV show, where everyone watches a God awful play on themselves.
Awful but funny. And this was born.
~***~
Sonic hopped from foot to foot energetically, looking out across the theater. He had been invited along with everyone else to a play based on their adventures, and thus far he was mildly impressed by the decor.
Everything was large and grand, with dark wood coloring and bright lights from above. There were several rows of seats in front of the stage, the big black curtain with the design of stars drawn to hide the actors preparing behind it. Around it were some balconies, and Sonic and friends were in the largest one directly opposite of the stage, presenting an excellent view. Leaning forward, ears twitching impatiently, he asked, "When's this show get on the road?"
"Be patient Sonic, it should be starting in about..." Tails checked his watch. "Five minutes."
"Hmm, alright, where's Knux and the others at?"
His fox friend turned his head from side to side, searching the crowds behind them as they stood in their box, the door open. "I think they went to get some food."
"Did Shadow actually accept the invite?" Sonic joked, resting against the railings.
"He did," Tails confirmed. "He's coming with Rouge. Amy should be arriving with Cream and Big any moment now."
Pleased that his questions were answered in such a timely manner, the hedgehog studied the invite he had received again.
Dear Mr. Hedgehog:
It would be the honor of the Angel Island Players, an association dedicated to culture, literature, and the preservation of all things thespian that you would kindly attend our play on you, and your friends', adventures so far. We have worked hard for the best effects, the best actors, and we hope you'll enjoy the show. We'll provide the best seats for you and your friends, the best food, and all will be on the house courtesy of the AIP Association.
Whether or not you come is entirely up to you, we understand the importance of your time. We guarantee the play is not as boring or formal as this letter.
Yours faithfully;
The Angel Island Players
It was that little acknowledgment to how bored Sonic had been just reading the letter that made him agree to go.
"They aren't entirely devoid of humor." He had told Tails the day he got the letter. It was then he had contacted the others to come with him, ("I'm not going to this play thing alone."), and now here they were.
The others arrived, filing into their seats just as the lights dimmed and centered on the stage now. Amy sat next to Sonic and flashed him a grin, and Sonic averted his eyes with a sigh. Ray the Squirrel marched proudly on stage, giving the audience a smile, then turned to face them with a microphone in hand.
"Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the first play ever conducted by the Angel Island Players! We've worked hard on this, and we hope on that note you all enjoy the show. Sonic the Hedgehog himself and friends are here personally to witness the play, why not give them a round of applause just for being the awesome people they are?"
The lights flashed up to their box, and Sonic flashed a cheeky grin and waved while Amy blew a kiss. Knuckles just covered his face, Silver waved a hand idly and Blaze ducked down behind the seat in front of her. Shadow huffed, crossing his arms, Rouge tossed them a wink, Vector flexed his muscles, Espio nodded in their direction, Charmy did a flip and smiled hugely while Cream and Cheese, along with Big, gave a shy smile. Tails made a peace sign and Omega rotated fully 360 degrees before coming to a rest, eyes flaring in the semi-darkness.
"Yes, they're awesome, and I hope we do you guys justice. Ah, sorry for rambling ladies and gents, let's get on with the show!" Ray retreated hastily as the curtain was drawn back, revealing an emerald green forest scene near the ocean. The palm trees waved in the grip of an invisible wind, and somehow the waves rippled.
An actor stepped triumphantly on stage, smirking hugely, with ridiculously wild and spiky blue hair. He was covered from head to toe in some sort of blue outfit too.
Shadow actually chuckled and Sonic blinked. "That's supposed to be me?"
"Isn't that Mighty?" Tails guessed.
"Shh!" Amy scolded.
The Sonic Actor paused to give them a thumbs up, still smirking hugely, then proclaimed loudly, "I, Sonic the Hedgehog, will now save the world from Dr. Robotnik!"
"Robotnik? He hasn't gone by-"
"Shh!" Amy glared at Tails.
"Muwahah, no you won't!"
Moving across the stage in a sort of...egg shaped device being suspended by very noticeable ropes with a sign across them in bold letters saying, "This is an invisible rope!", a fat man in a red suit that looked like a Santa Claus knockoff with sunglasses riding inside of it raised a fist to shout, "You are not going to win, Hedgehog!"
At first Sonic screamed, "NOOO!" and tried to claw desperately at the strange "invisible" barrier around him, then he finally faced Robotnik.
A band struck up a dramatic battle song, and a large wrecking ball colored bronze and brown lowered itself from the depths of the egg pod. It swung "menacingly" from front to back, and the Sonic Actor gave a gasp of fake surprise and horror.
"This all you got, Robuttnik? Time for a...SUPER SONIC SPIN!" The Actor leaped into the air, using his head like a cannonball and crashed into the pod.
"No!" Robotnik screamed, almost falling out of the pod. "You have bested me!"
"Gee," Sonic complained. "Give 'Robotnik' a bit more credit than that."
The actor continued to go on about how the world was so cruel, then he was dragged away in his pod.
The play continued, with Sonic crossing several "dangerous" obstacles-"God no it's the ELECTRON BUNNIES!"-leaping several gaps-"THE BOTTOMLESS PIT OF DESPAIR!"-and defeating Robotnik some more times-"Fire? Who would have guessed!"-before he was vanquished for the last time and they got to a scene on Sonic meeting Tails.
Tails, who had been griping continuously until Amy threatened to shut him up for good, finally perked up. "Hey, this should be where I come in!"
The Sonic Actor, whom Sonic was beginning to dislike more every moment, spotted a fox lying underneath a tree. Making a big show of carefully approaching the orange fox, he then said loudly, "I'm Sonic, Sonic the Hedgehog, who are you, and are you okay?"
The fox sat up, facing the crowd, and at first Sonic thought it was a stuffed animal with...nine tails?
Then he recognized the "stuffed animal."
"Tails doll." Tails whispered hoarsely.
"Pardon?" Silver said absentmindedly, knowing he wouldn't appear until much later in the play.
"TAILS D-"
Amy lunged forward, covering his mouth. "Shut up!" She hissed.
From inside the doll an upbeat, childish, European voice spoke up. "I'm fine, Sonic! My name is Tails, a pleasure to meet you!"
The Sonic Actor got into some sort of conversation with "Tails", and Sonic noticed the real Tails looking like he was going to claw his own ears off.
Even though the Tails Doll was annoying, speaking up constantly and continuously throughout the second portion of the play, he was helpful.
"Sonic, I was not that annoying, right?"
Sonic just chuckled, remembering the first time he had met Tails.
"Hey, Sonic, over here!"
"Sonic, this way!"
"Look what I found, Sonic!"
"Heh heh..."
"What?" Tails asked, then caught Amy's eye and shrank into his seat.
Time seemed to crawl by and Sonic still found himself watching the play, somehow unable to look away, like during a car crash or something. When Knuckles was about to be introduced, Rouge shook him awake.
"Your part is coming up," she informed him. He blinked sleepily before eying the stage balefully, already expecting the worst.
The Knuckles Actor...was a bull. A red furred bull with spiked gloves and a deadly, powerful appearance. He announced he was going to protect the Master Emerald before pummeling Super Sonic, causing him to drop the Chaos Emeralds, and running away with them. The bull's temper seemed to explode at the slightest provocation, but his voice was actually pretty close to Knuckles's own, except the fact it was deeper.
Knuckles broke into laughter as the Knuckles Actor succeeded in stealing the Emeralds, wiping tears from his eyes. "Hey, Sonic, I think I just changed my mind on this play." He pointed to the spiny bull making off with the gems.
Sonic just smirked in response, knowing...well, he was supposed to win in the end.
Sonic watched 'Super Sonic' leap forward and destroy 'Robotnik's' airships, applauding with the others as they got to a brief interlude in the show.
"Oh, I should be next!" Amy gushed.
Blaze flicked her tail, taking a sip of her drink. "Silver and I aren't for a while, I think."
"No worries," Silver said with a grin. He struck a heroic pose without apparently realizing it, making Cream giggle. "I'm sure our part won't be as bad as Tails." He gave Tails a wink to take the sting out of his words, but it wasn't apparently working, because the young fox gave a sour look to everyone.
"Tails Doll?"
"Metal Sonic actually looks pretty good." Vector interjected, taking a massive munch out of his sandwich, referring to the rather clunky silver 'Metal Sonic'.
"Well, of course he does. Shadow..." Rouge gave him a look. "If you're bad, don't go hurting the people in the play, understand?"
Shadow was standing back from the group, arms crossed, but he nodded in response to her words. "I'm not so pathetic that I'll go 'beating up' the people for bad acting." He scoffed like the very idea was crazy.
"I should hope not," Omega said, speaking for the first time.
Satisfied, the friends returned for another segment of terrible acting. The play resumed with Amy, a rather beautiful, skinny hedgehog girl, chasing after Sonic.
"Oh Sonic, you're the best, wait up, Sonic!"
Amy's green eyes flashed like fire in the semi-darkness, and Sonic turned his head as she hissed, "I'm dressed like-like Rouge!"
"You say that like it's a bad thing," Rouge said lazily.
A overpowered looking Metal Sonic swooped down and stole Amy off the stage, her cries echoing loudly.
"Sonic! SOOONIIIC!" She sobbed his name.
"I-I didn't-" Amy started again.
"Cool your temper," Blaze told her softly as Espio snickered with Charmy.
Sonic buried his face into his hands as the play continued to progress. He wanted to just get up and leave.
Why did I agree to come here?
Big's Actor was actually pretty accurate, simple minded, fat, but strong and succeeded in getting Froggie.
"At least someone's is right," Amy complained. She didn't even want to get started on the buff guy in a blue suit playing Chaos, or the over dramatic, sobbing girl playing Tikal. She was very irritated they made Gamma into some sort of...insane robot bent on destruction, until the very end, where she started crying all over again.
Cream's Actor, on the other hand, was insanely adorable, as was the Chao with her, but the Chao was an Angel Chao instead.
"That's okay," Cream told them. "Cheese and I don't mind."
Sonic kept looking at the whole play, wishing to God something would drop and hit the actors. He had half a thought to ask Silver to drop a lamp on them, but knew he wouldn't until both his and Blaze's parts were complete.
"Hey, Sonic, Shadow's part is coming up." Tails told him miserably.
Omega turned his glowing eyes back to the stage, moving his gaze away from the wall he had been looking at after the play had gone on for only ten minutes.
Sonic lifted his head, smirking, as a black and red clone of the Actor version of himself stomped threateningly on stage. He had a rocket pack on his back and he gave what was an attempt at evil laughter, but sounded like a gruff guffaw.
"I am the ULTIMATE LIFE FORM! THIS IS WHO I AM!"
"We're not even at Shadow's main part yet," groaned Charmy and Silver couldn't stop from laughing until Shadow silenced them with a red eyed glare.
"Don't kill the actors, Shadow." Rouge said to her friend again.
The thought must have crossed his mind because Shadow's eye twitched briefly before relaxing.
Later on when the Amy Actor was supposed to mistake Shadow for Sonic, they ended up kissing instead.
"Shadow, you're such a bad boy!" The Amy Actor said, causing Amy to shrink away from Shadow.
"What the he-" Shadow began but cut himself off.
Rouge was some sort of sultry bimbo which Knuckles informed her wasn't far from the mark. He was rewarded with a shocked huff and a cup of soda to the face, along with a slap.
"That was a high five to the face, congratulating your stupidity." Charmy snickered to Knuckles.
When they got to the part with Maria, Shadow visibly twitched in his seat, and Omega put a claw on his shoulder to steady him.
She was actually rather accurate in appearance, but she was rather annoying, Sonic thought. She threw her arms around the Shadow Actor, who had a scar for some reason on his muzzle. "SHADOW!" She proclaimed, sobbing. "You give me so much hope! Hope for the future, the past, and the present! HANG ON TO YOUR HOPE!"
Shadow stood up, knocking Omega's hand off, but Rouge shoved him down again. His red eyes burned into the actors, as if he was plotting their deaths even as he sat.
The farther it went, to the point of the pink Biolizard, Sonic had to leave with Shadow for some fresh air before they both did something they might regret. As they returned back into the dark theater, Tails whispered, "You missed our official meeting with Cream, not her 'cameo'."
"We're at the Metal Overlord part now?"
Tails nodded, pulling his ears in despair every time his actor spoke, which was always.
"I AM METAL OVERLOAD!" The metallic dragon roared as many different people pulled on ropes to move the gigantic puppet. A loud voice whispered, "Metal Overlord."
"Oh-er-METAL OVERLORD! FEAR ME, METAL OVERLORD! DON'T YOU DARE LAUGH, SUFFERIOR LIFEFORMS!"
"Inferior!" The voice "whispered" again.
Sonic put his palm on his face, sighing loudly. The backgrounds were beautiful, some technology based and others were real plants and animals, but the actors were terrible.
Vector was a bull dog for some reason, with a New York accent, going on about money. Charmy was a fly that flew around talking hyper fast, and Espio had on a bandanna over his mouth and was dressed like some sort of Anime ninja Sonic had seen. When he opened a door, smoke oozed out before Espio would leap dramatically through. Omega was an over violent, beeping robot that shot everything that moved with the message, "Beep boop bee boop, must destroy EGGMAN'S ROBOTS!"
Omega said simply, "This play is a mockery."
Amy almost spilled her drink when Tails's Actor exclaimed, "LEVEL UP!" after collecting an orb.
Later on, they met Emerl-"I R E-MERL."-fought him, and moved on.
A black starfish suspended limply on a string twitched its arms at Shadow. "I am Black Doom," said a computerized, dark voice. "Help me take over the world."
"I'm Shadow the Hedgehog, this is who I am, and I do not take orders from you!"
Every other minute or so Shadow said "damn" without any apparent reason, and the other characters did too. When they got to the freezing gas effect from Black Doom, it was changed to ice that Shadow burst dramatically from and transformed into Super Shadow.
"You cannot best me, because..."He paused dramatically. "I AM YOUR FATHER!"
Shadow fell to his knees. "Noo!"
The Shadow actor "fought"-by which he simply jumped and made violent gestures, throwing things that people in black made sure connected-then he stood proudly on Black Doom's corpse and said, "I AM SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG!"
Shadow buried his face in his hands.
They went through the whole messy Gemerl slash Emerl business, did some serious fighting while everyone kept powering themselves up and healing while Sonic kept slamming Emerl into the ground violently during their final battle, and they made it to Blaze's portion.
Blaze's Actor was a lean, pretty, Siamese cat with pale fur and eyes. She walked around royally, her nose turned up and...
Daintily launched ten foot flames from the tips of her claws.
Blaze smiled and laughed a little at that, and Marine's Actor was a country accented possum.
"Good thing she's not here," Tails whispered as Sonic grimaced for the one hundredth time that night as she shouted, "Why howdy thar, Sonic!"
The background changed during an interlude, and Rouge succeeded in stopping Shadow from leaving the play-"It's almost over anyway."-and now they sat down again to reveal a lava scene.
Nimbly bounding from rock to rock, a silver, spiky haired mouse like creature paused to survey the landscape.
"In the name of Justice, Blaze and I will stop Iblis, or my name is not SILVER THE HEDGEHOG!"
"Could have been worse," Silver said with a shrug.
As expected, Amy's mistaking Silver for Sonic was replaced with another make out scene that made Amy leave the room while Silver covered his face with one glowing hand.
Mephiles was a kick butt evil villain with crystals for hair and black fur. He waved his hand around dramatically while talking, his mouth covered by a veil. Omega's shooting him was replaced with rockets instead of bullets, blowing the poor actor off the stage.
"Just stop this." Shadow complained more to himself then Rouge. Omega seemed interested in the wall again.
When Sonic was killed, everyone in the crowd moaned in horror. Princess Elise, also wearing rather revealing clothes, kissed his dead corpse before he came back and they fought off the giant, puppet Solaris, which looked pretty accurate and cool like the other puppets.
"When that happened, I'm surprised you let her kiss him." Silver told Amy.
Amy blinked. "I guess I was just in so much shock..."
"Kissing dead hedgehogs," Shadow scoffed.
They got to the part where Blaze "died", and Silver told Amy to shut up so he could watch it, sniffling slightly.
"How did you guys-" Tails began, thinking of the massive time paradox.
"Long story." Blaze interrupted.
They entered the portion where Sonic became a Knight-(A massive laser beam blasted from his sword for no apparent reason.)-where Sonic entered some Arabian story-"I'll get you, you street rat!"-and then Eggman blew up the planet.
"Jeesh, I can't stand a moment more of this." Sonic complained again as his Actor became buffer and the flying dog on a rope, Chip, told him they had a world to save. The "Werehog" and the dog trooped off again to go...somewhere. Sonic had lost track.
Amy rolled her eyes. "At least you don't make out with every single character. I just kissed a Werehog!"
"I feel sick," Rouge grumbled, looking at Knuckles who nodded in agreement.
"Let's blow this joint." Sonic said.
They all left, heading out of the theater before it was even over.
"It was so erratic." Tails grumbled.
"And stupid."
"Terrible."
"The food was good though," Vector laughed.
"And the effects were decent."
"However, if I ever get an invite again, I'm not accepting." Shadow interrupted.
"Heck yeah."
"I agree."
"Who's cruddy idea was this?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Sonic shrugged, pulling out the invite again. "The Angel Island Players did the play, but the script was written by some company called SEGA."
~***~
Erratic? Missing portions? All intended, this is a complete crackfic! I write better than this but this was only a parody slash humor fiction.
On that note, please review!