Author Note: Characters are not my creations, blah blah blah, yackety shmackety, and all that other good stuff.
Also I would like to note that I always pictured the Sonic characters as being like twenty and that is why they can drink and stuff like that. Special thanks to DJ Bleach and WolvenWindNinja for their reviews.
Well at the end of the last chapter, in case you have forgotten, Knuckles and the others had stopped by the HydroCity Zone Beer Distributors to get their keg for the party. When they got there they discovered that the Chaotix had bought the place out and would basically provide all the booze that Knux felt was necessary for free. Now back to the fic…
Knuckles walked back over to his jeep with his carton of cigarettes in hand. He could not believe his luck. The Chaotix were going to provide free liquor for all of his parties from now on. What was originally going to be a BYOB party had just turned into a miniature version of OctoberFest. As he opened up the driver side door though Sonic nearly exploded with rage:
"Knuckles what the hell are you doing?" he spat, "You were supposed to get BOOZE not cigarettes!"
"Hey, calm down ya idiot," Knuckles replied with a wide grin, "FYI the Chaotix now own this place so were getting free liquor for tonight,".
"The Chaotix," Tails broke in suddenly sounding confused, "I thought they were some form of detective agency,".
"Well, Vector is up there standing behind the counter," said Knux while tearing into his carton of Angel Island lights, "he said that they made more money doing this anyway. Want a smoke Blue?" he finished offering Sonic an entire pack of the cigs.
"Sure," said Sonic as he snatched the small box out of the echidnas' hands, "so where to now?
"Well…," he thought, but Tails cut in.
"Did you get any food or anything for tonight?"
"Damn," Knuckles cursed under his breath, "you know I knew I forgot something. Well I guess we're going to have to make another stop then."
Knuckles fired up the jeeps' engine and they sped off away from the Distributors. As they were driving Sonic started to rummage around in the glove box and console. He kept on looking till a certain CD caught his eye. Picking it up he noted that there was no label on the front and that it was in very good condition.
"Hey Knux," began Sonic, "what's this CD?"
"Oh, hell yeah," came his response, "dude I haven't seen that in forever, where did you find it?"
"Right here in the glove box. Why?"
"Dude, just put it in the player," the red echidna insisted.
"OK, but it better not be any of that rap stuff,".
Sonic carefully removed his Metallica CD and put in the unlabeled disc. After a few moments of silence he turned up the volume, figuring it was just really quiet, and just a split second later an extremely loud techno remix came roaring out of the speakers.
"Whoa, dude, that is amazing," commented Sonic.
"Oh that's nothing," Knuckles said, "check this shit out,".
He reached down and pressed a button next to the radio. The back end of the jeep opened up and revealed two subwoofers that turned on immediately and nearly caused Tails to go deaf.
After about twenty minutes of driving down the road whilst blaring the echidnas' techno music and a couple of cigarettes later, the trio pulled into a big parking lot. They got out and Sonic looked up at the name of the place where they had stopped.
"Knuckles…you have got to be kidding me," the blue blur said.
"What, you know they have one of these everywhere," Knuckles said after a small chuckle.
The trio walked into the Floating Islands' Wal-Mart and were greeted by random old guy number one. After getting a cart and walking around the store for a short while they finally started thinking about what to get for that night:
"Well we definitely need to get the snacks out of the way," began Knux, "how about some Lava Reef barbecue chips and pretzels?"
"Ok, that sounds good," agreed Sonic, "but how about we get some Aquatic Ruins cola just in case someone doesn't want liquor tonight?"
"Hey, now that's smart thinking there," stated Knuckles, "you're not such a jackass after all,".
Sonic just sighed. The two carried on discussing some other things to get, including paper cups and disposable plates and silverware, until they realized that something was missing.
"Hey, don't you feel like we're missing something?" inquired Sonic of his red friend.
"Yeah, there is some strange absence here," Knuckles agreed.
It took the two a moment of contemplation before they both figured out what it was.
"Tails," started Sonic.
"Yeah where the hell is he?", Knuckles asked looking around.
"I bet he went over to electronics dude," Sonic finally answered, "you know how he can get when he sees anything that deals with electronics,".
"Uh huh," agreed Knux with a nod of his head.
The two proceeded over to the electronics department, and found Tails looking at the rock section of the music racks. As they approached him they saw that he was looking at a case that had a nighttime background with searchlights pointed into the air and brass horns forming the letters on the front.
"Yo, Sonic, Knux, come look at this," he said enthusiastically waving them over.
"What is it Tails?" asked Sonic less than half as interested as the two tailed fox.
"It's the Stardust Speedway Orchestras' new CD," he answered shoving the case under Sonics' nose, "It's that band that covers hard rock and metal music with brass instruments,".
"Hey I've heard of these guys," Knuckles chimed in, "I heard they are really good,".
"Hm, maybe we could remix some of this in to tonight's music list," thought Sonic aloud.
"Yeah, it's only ten bucks anyways," Tails pointed out, "and if we don't like it Wal-Mart always accepts exchanges,".
"That is true," Knuckles said through a small laugh.
"Well I can't think of anything else that we might need then," Sonic said, "so I guess we should go wait at the checkout lines,".
"Ugh," groaned Knuckles, "hey there's one of those self-checkout machines, and there is no one waiting to use it,".
"Yeah Sonic why not just use it?" asked Tails.
"Hey if you two want to use that damned thing be my guest," stated Sonic, "every time I do it takes forever to use,".
"Ok then I'll use it and get all of our stuff checked out myself," stated Knuckles.
Knux pushed the cart of stuff over to the machine and pressed the button for English.
"Welcome, please scan your first Item!" stated the machine.
Knuckles scanned their chips and pretzels, placed them in the stupid plastic bags, and put the bag in the cart. He then attempted to scan the disposable plates but it wouldn't let him.
"What the hell?" Knux said to himself.
"Please place item in the bagging area!" the machine said
"What, I did!" he said, "hey, you, Wal-Mart dude!"
"Yeah, what's up?" asked Mike the cashier.
"What's up with this…it won't let me scan my plates," Knux said kinda agitated.
"Just hit that stupid button on the touch screen that says "I don't want to bag this item" there and you can keep going," Mike said.
"Oh, ok, thanks man," said the echidna.
So Knuckles scanned the plates and cups, and put them in and pressed the button on the touch screen again.
"Please wait for assistance!" the infernal machine chimed in.
"Ugh," Knuckles sighed, "hey dude, what's wrong with this thing?"
"Eh, the damn thing is upset that you pressed that button twice," Mike said, anger rising in his voice because of the machine that he called the "Spawn of Satan". "There…," the cashier said hitting a button on his monitor, "it should be good now,".
"Thanks again," said the echidna.
Knuckles scanned the cola and tried to scan the Stardust Speedway disc but when he did the machine said "unknown item…please set item aside and an associate will assist you,".
"Er," Mike the cashier growled, "I'll help you all right. Die you infernal piece of --CENSORED--CENSORED-- !!!"
He had ripped the credit card machine off of the side of the self checkout and chucked it into the things touch screen. Knuckles, Sonic, and Tails looked on with a sense of bewildered amusement as the cashier who had seemed to be so friendly, proceeded to scream obscenities at the machine while he ripped out the wires and other circuitry that made the thing run.
"Assist that you piece of garbage," Mike hollered. He then turned around to face the trio of friends:
"What you three just saw never happened. Ok? Now, take your stuff and just leave,".
"Uhm, so you're just giving us this stuff free?" Sonic asked.
"Yeah sure, why not, I'm gonna be fired for that little incident anyways once they trace it to me,".
"Well hey if you need a new job my friends over at the HydroCity Zone Beer Distributors can hook you up," said Knuckles, "just tell them Knuckles sent you,".
"Alright, sounds good, thanks dude," said Mike, "see you guys later and have a nice day,".
"You too," Tails called back to him as the three walked out of the store.
Ok chapter three is finally done.
I got a PM and review recently that brought up a question about the characters ages in this fic. I wanted to clarify that I have ALWAYS thought the characters were around the age of twenty, and that's why the party is a drinking party.
Anyways, I had to put myself in this fic somewhere and a Wal-Mart setting was just perfect since I work at one as a cashier. Also there were more level references in this chapter. Whoever can tell me what level is from which game I will be sure to acknowledge them in the next update (the only reason I'm doing level references is for nostalgia and I think it's fun). Expect another update soon my faithful readers.
Sons of Ocelot