Speedy's note: This story is meant to fit into my Triple Threat Series, but all you need to know about it is basically that it's set some undeterminded time after Sonic Heroes, and before Sonic Forces. I had already written some parts of it by the time Forces came out.

This fic has been a sort of side project for the longest time. I'd come back to it whenever I was in the mood, but I was in no rush to go anywhere with it. Consequently it had a lot of time to slowly develop its ideas and concepts, and then about half a year ago quickly grew in length and complexity because then I had some time. I loved writing it. Like, so much. It's a very self-indulgent story; I started it just to have lots of space to focus on things that I'd wanted to explore in more depth for a long time.

It's probably an unusual story. It takes a lot of time with its ideas, it explores lore and history, language, culture and science. It's one for the geeks and loremasters, for the fans of theories and background ideas, for those enjoying slice of life, a dash of angst, and lots of friendship.

This story might not be for everyone. If you love Team Sonic friendship feels and really quite over the top world building, it's probably for you. If you hate those things or come looking for a fast paced plot, this fic is probably not for you. It's an explory, talky, geeky story full of details and weird concepts. I had tons of fun writing it and researching for it, and I hope some of you will enjoy it as much. But don't say I didn't warn you. ;)

Skyfire

The Alignment

"Hey, Sonic!" It was Tails' excited shouting that pulled Sonic out of an afternoon nap in the sun.

"Huh?" The blue hedgehog cracked an eye open and squinted against the sunlight, leaning down slightly from his spot on the roof of Tails' workshop and house. "What's up for you to -" The words were cut off by a yawn. "-for you to come running like this?" Sonic finished with a grin.

"Here, this just came with the newest issue of Mobian Science Today." Now that he looked more closely, Sonic noticed the piece of paper Tails was holding. "They're letting a select few people into the catacombs below the pyramids they unearthed in the deserts south of Shamar. You can apply for a visit here if you're quick. I think it sounds cool?" There was a question there and a Look was thrown up at Sonic.

The hedgehog jumped off the roof to land at Tails' side. "Catacombs sound cool, yeah," he nodded. Exploring old ruins always turned out fun, and after the latest defeat Eggman was lying low and Sonic's life could use some extra action, or just a fun trip.

Tails beamed. "I was thinking we could ask Knuckles, too, old ruins are quite up his alley."

"Good idea," Sonic agreed. Their echidna friend needed to get off his island more, and it seemed a promising excuse. "I'll call him!"

It took four attempts, a climb up a hill for signal boosting, a run to pass the time and a snack of chili dogs in between lots of waiting out radio silence until Sonic managed to get Knuckles to answer his communicator. Sonic knew he didn't carry it around like normal people did, but tended to leave it to lie around somewhere, so your chances of getting the echidna to answer his radio were bigger in the evening hours when Knuckles would come home. Kind of like Sonic, he didn't always come home, though, and even his overall lack of patience aside, when it came to trying to raise Knuckles via radio it was Sonic and not Tails who coped with the long lack of reply better.

"Yes?"

Sonic grinned. Another thing about talking to Knuckles via radio was that he didn't seem to pick up the common phrases to start a conversation. "Hey Knux, this is Sonic."

"Don't tell me Eggman's back at it already." He sounded a little exasperated.

Sonic laughed. "No, all's quiet. It's about something else. Tails would be able to get tickets for visiting the underground catacombs below an ancient pyramid. It doesn't open often, and not for many people, so it's a rare chance. We thought you might like to come."

There was a brief pause. "It does sound interesting," Knuckles trailed. "When did you say it was?"

"Two weeks from now."

"... I don't have time, I have plans."

Sonic blinked stupidly at his communicator for a second. When you were trying to talk that grump of an echidna into having some fun, you usually had to expect resistance. The common "guardian duty, no time for fun" kind of argument. That was what was normal. Since when did Knuckles have plans? It was early summer, and no time for any harvesting or whatnot yet that could keep Knuckles busy. "You have plans," Sonic echoed, just to confirm.

"Sure I do," Knuckles grumbled. "Don't you have any? Did you forget the date? Seems like you, but unlike Tails... Don't you guys have anywhere to be?" He sounded a familiar, but unexpected mix of confused and annoyed now.

"Anywhere to be for what?" Sonic stared at the radio, unable to stare at Knuckles in person.

There was a sigh. "The Alignment, Sonic?"

"What alignment?" Sonic scratched behind his ear.

"The Alignment?" Knuckles sounded incredulous now. "Are you kidding me?"

"No, really, what sort of alignment? What are you aligning?"

"Go try to prank someone else, Sonic, I don't have time for this." There came a rustle and crack and then statics.

"Knuckles? Did you hang up on me?" Sonic shook his head to himself. "He hung up on me... Now that went well."

"He hung up on you?" Tails stared at him. "What did you say to him? It's so like you two to get into a fight even via voice calls..."

"I didn't say anything that could've upset him," Sonic defended himself. He liked to rile Knuckles up for fun at times, but he'd been trying to do the opposite, and he still had no idea what he'd done wrong. "First he sounded like he wanted to come, but then he said he didn't have time. He was constantly on about some "alignment"."

"Alignment?" Tails frowned. "Of what?"

Sonic shrugged. "No idea, he didn't say, and I kind of think he thought I knew what was up with it and trying to get on his nerves by pretending not to know?" Thinking back, this seemed the most likely explanation on what had happened.

"We could try again and ask?"

Sonic folded his arms. "Good luck with that."

"Hmm." Tails frowned. "It's still weird."

His customary long evening run had driven the thought of their friend's weird behaviour mostly from Sonic's mind, and he stepped back into the hangar a bit hungry, but relaxed.

He found Tails sitting in front of his computer, screens filled with graphs, text, but also pictures.

"New project I don't know about yet?" Sonic walked up to him to look over his shoulder. "Is that a star chart?" He leaned in closer.

Tails nodded. "I think I found out what Knuckles was talking about."

Sonic's gaze trailed incredulously over the screen before he raised a brow at Tails. "Knuckles does astronomy?"

Tails frowned. "I'm not sure. I was thinking about what he could've meant, but I couldn't come up with anything. Until I went back to my magazine." He pointed at the glossy paper on the table to the side. It remained open on a page near the middle, showing an article headlined by a photo of a starry sky behind the black silhouette of a Mobius Loop. "It's an article about the rare alignment, or grouping, as it's normally called, of the planets," Tails continued.

"The planets," Sonic repeated.

"Yes. All planets orbit the sun, but at different speeds." Tails turned back to his computer, and quick fingers pulled up a moving image, with a small yellow sun in the middle and tiny dots for planets that circled it. "The planets move at different speeds, so usually some are on one side of the sun, and the others on the other side, also from our planet's perspective. Sometimes, though, some of them will coincide."

The fox opened up another window that showed a picture of five bright dots against a dark background. It was drawing, not a photo, and the artist had added the horizon, the planets' names and a bunch of numbers that meant nothing to Sonic.

Tails was still speaking, though. "When two planets align it's called a conjunction. Those are pretty common and easy to observe; they happen several times per year. Groupings, in particular larger groupings, are exceedingly rare and don't happen particularly regularly. Sometimes they happen as often as several times per year, then they don't happen for 200 years, and a good amount of those that do happen are only visible from a few positions on our planet, or they end up obscured by the sun because they happen during daylight, for example."

Tails pointed back at his magazine. "This year, we see the rare grouping of the five closest planets to Mobius, those you can see with the naked eye. Visible quintuplets happen between 50 and several hundred years apart, sometimes not in a thousand years even, so astronomers all over the world are looking forward to observing it."

The blue hedgehog needed a moment to digest the lengthy science monologue Tails had thrown at him again, but he had Practice. "So, this year five planets can be seen close together in the sky and that's a thing that happens only every few hundred years, so it's a big deal for geeks that like stars. That all makes sense," Sonic allowed, trailing the small planets on the screen as they circled their sun. It was hypnotising. "But I have trouble thinking Knuckles a science geek who'll happily sit around with his telescope all night to look at some rare gathering of planets."

Tails shut off the distracting images and span round in his chair to face Sonic. "I've been at this point, too, yes. I think it might be something religious, or a cultural event."

"Religious or cultural," Sonic repeated.

"Yes." Tails turned back to his computer, the planets and star charts vanished to be replaced with pictures of the ruins of an Echidna temple and a collection of photos and drawings showing hieroglyphics resembling those on the walls in the underground tunnels up on Angel Island. "The old Echidnas used a very complicated calendar, but some of its events were based on astronomic observation. Lunar phases, and the movement of other celestial bodies, like certain stars."

"Or planets." Sonic raked a hand through his quills. "So, you think we're looking at some sort of Echidnaen New Year or whatnot?"

Tails shrugged. "Not a new year, historians aren't sure about much concerning Knuckles' ancestors, but they are sure they knew a yearly cycle similar to ours. But as I said, it's really complex." He pointed at a picture. "To decipher the date here, you need to do quite some math, and pick out which part of it retains to which cycle, 'cause there are several."

"A very complicated new year then? A new cycle of however many years a cycle has?" Sonic frowned. "This is kind of mind-blowing. Then again, Knuckles seemed to think I was silly to not know." He grinned.

"If I'm right, it's some kind of important event in his culture." Tails turned back around. "There's probably supposed to be some sort of celebration." He bit his lip, the large ears drooping low. "But Knuckles is the only one of his kind, there isn't anyone to celebrate with him. It's sad to think he's so alone."

Sonic frowned. "He may be the last of his kind, but he's got us, too. What do you think, we scrap the trip and crash an Echidna party instead?"

Tails looked doubtful. "We have no idea what this is even about. Maybe he wants to be alone for it..."

Sonic shook his head. "No party is meant to celebrate alone, no matter how ancient. He survived decorating a tree with us."

"You think that means he'd survive us ruining his traditional celebration?" Tails grinned. "Sure?"

Sonic grinned back. "Don't be so negative, I've been to so many celebrations, this can't be weirder than throwing fake fish at people during that river-flood festival I once attended in that jungle zone, or the party where you'd get showered in colour powder, or, you know, decorating trees to keep presents under them. It's all fun."

Tails stared at him thoughtfully. "You know, you're kind of right, most traditions are weird."

Sonic nodded. "Can't be much worse."

Tails glanced back at his screen. "And we got two weeks for additional research so we don't turn up entirely unprepared."

"Think that'll help? We could just fly up there and ask Knuckles to just let us attend, and try to wing it as we always do."

Tails grimaced. "Your idea can be our Plan B."