revivalproject | [Open] there goes the neighborhood

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[Open] there goes the neighborhood

WHO: Sonic & ~~Knuckles~~ YOU
WHERE: Temba, The Warrens
WHAT: That Time a Volcano Happened
WHEN: All Over August
WARNINGS: None, will update if needed

1. Lava ~~Reef~~ City Zone Act 1: August 10th, early morning

With one guy giving kinda vague instructions and another guy TYPING AS LOUD AS HE COULD (???) on the network, and the alien lady hopping on the network giving equally vague and harder to understand instructions, all saying to get everyone underground (instead of evacuating which would have made more sense to Sonic but hey, not his clown, not his circus), the hedgehog springs into action pretty much immediately. Well actually, he was just woken up in the middle of the night by his communicator screeching at him, so he's less springing into action and more groaning and rolling his eyes at the clock and stumbling out of bed into action, but hey, he's still quick about it. Either way, he's up and hitting the streets, peeking into places he knows some people to hang out if he doesn't already see them up and about, knocking on doors and windows and stuff, y'know just being as annoying as he can be since this is kind of an emergency.

"Helloooo, you awake in there? It's kinda Doomsday, you might wanna get up."

He doesn't sound too urgent, but that's just because he has a pretty skewed sense of danger. They have ten whole hours! It's not even a big deal. (It's a pretty big deal.)

2. Lava ~~Reef~~ City Zone Act 2: August 10th, too close to explode time lol

Oookay actually, it turns out they don't have quite as much time to prepare and get to where they need to be as Sonic thought. Just because he doesn't own anything that he's attached to enough to want to move to the mines doesn't mean nobody else does, and as far as he can tell, that's what seems to be slowing people down the most. The earthquakes aren't really helping. As stupid as being out here is, Sonic's still out and about looking for stragglers, and he's not shy at all about running right up on anyone he finds.

"Hey, we're kind of about to die? Do you need help moving anything? I can carry a lot more than I look like I can, load me up!"

3. Sonic Underground (no not that one): The remainder of August, wooo hooo

3a: This is weird and cramped and it sucks and Sonic's always hungry and he hates it, but he tries not to complain too much. They are, after all, alive, and Sonic is of course grateful for the little fungus dudes and the creepy looking little berry guys. Since he's cut off from the outside and is thus pretty much incapable of moving around like he's used to, he spends a pretty significant amount of his time just watching them do their thing and trying to find ways to help them out. Which would be easier if he could, y'know, communicate with them? Maybe someone can try to help him figure out what these little dudes are saying so he can actually be helpful.

3b: The rest of the time he's on the look out for people to hang out with or drag into exploring with him, but a lot of the time he just vanishes and heads deeper into The Warrens to explore by himself. Which is probably not the smartest thing to do, seeing as this place is basically a maze. It's probably fine, though.

Except that he's completely lost. Not bothered by it, though. It's just an excuse to explore further in, right? (How has he survived LIFE for this long?) Anyone else that's out this way for whatever reason may run into Sonic following pipes, standing on machinery (why???), creeping around in dark rooms looking for anything he might be able to bring back with him, or checking out the big, mysterious blast doors. And by 'checking out', I mean spin dashing into and bouncing off of, to no avail. Weird that they're here, right?

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Really, it doesn't take much to get Link to go exploring with Sonic. If fact it takes no convincing at all, considering that Link is already exploring himself, when he runs into Sonic.

"...Hi," he says, apparently unbothered by Sonic standing on the machinery. In fact Link is so unbothered that he decides to join Sonic, climbing up to stand beside him.

"Hey, bud! How's it goin'?" Same as it's been since the eruption, surely, but y'know. Gotta try for that small talk. Sonic scoots over to make room for Link.

"For the record, I don't know what this thing does. I just wanted to feel taller."

Link...shrugs.

Volcano exploded. Stuck underground. Bored out of his brain. It's not really good, but it could be worse.

Everyone got out alive. Which was more than could be said for the Calamity.

As for Sonic's wish to be taller, Link considers this a moment. Despite the fact that Link is shorter than nearly everyone in Hyrule - and most of the people here - it's not a desire he's experienced. Why would he need to be taller? He can always climb something, if he wants to be up high.

"...You want to stand on my shoulders?" He might not possess the same desire, but he could help Sonic live it anyway.

Oh my god Link, Sonic was joking about wanting to feel taller. It's fine though, Sonic finds it amusing. Link's a pretty literal guy, huh.

"Heh, no, I'm good. Thanks for the offer, though. Have you found anything interesting down here yet?"

Link, alas, is not always the best at picking up other people's jokes. Which is an odd kind of irony, as his own tendency for blank-faced expressions means his own humour can be hard to pick up as well.

"Pipes. Doors I can't open. More weird machines." Which was interesting, even if Link didn't really understand what it was all for, or how it worked.

"Ah yeah, the doors. I was bored so I tried to break 'em down, couldn't get them to budge at all though. Just kinda amplifies the whole 'trapped underground' thing. It's makin' me antsy."

He even looks a bit twitchy. Link bruh he's not doing great, but shh it's fine.

"...Like Calibrations."

Although not exactly. The experience was...different. No strange dreams at night, but instead there was the uncertainty. Uncertainty about what destruction had been wrought up above. Uncertainly about how long they would be down here for.

But there were similarities. The same kinds of impenetrable doors. The same kind of...space.

"This isn't the first time I've heard someone compare all this to the Calibrations. You think this is the same place? Or maybe this town just has two creepy underground facilities to trap people in."

Like sure, this time it was to save people from a volcano, which still doesn't make sense to Sonic but it seems to have worked? Can't argue with results.

Ash could probably sleep through a hurricane and maybe even a volcano so even with knocking on the door he remains fast asleep and snoring softly. While Ash is a particularly heavy sleeper, Pikachu is not.

He opens his eyes and takes a moment to register that someone is knocking on the door. Then he hears the bit about doomsday and he crawls up to Ash's face to poke it to try and wake up his sleeping trainer.

"Pikapi. Pikachu." Pikachu says insistently but Ash sleeps on. Pikachu lets out a sigh. "Pika..."

If Sonic is still outside the door he'll see a flash of bright light followed by a started yelp and the harsh 'Thud.' Moments later Ash Ketchum is opening the door, looks jolts of static in his hair and Pikachu perched 'innocently' on his shoulder.

"Hey Sonic, what are you doing here so early?" He whines.

Of course the flash and the noises that follow are alarming... but it's probably fine. See, Ash is answering the door and he's mmmmaybe a little electrified?? That's probably normal.

"Hey, guys! Sorry to wake you up so early. I take it you haven't heard about the volcano yet?"

Link thinks about it a moment.

"Same kind of place," he says eventually. "Maybe made by the same people."

Whether there was any physical connection between the two, Link didn't know. But there was definitely some connection.

"Do you know Tommy? He thinks there's some other aliens that do the Calibrations thing, not the Agrii. I couldn't say either way, just a fun little factoid I guess."

He hadn't been caught up in Calibrations, but he had visited the cave that people were saying was the entrance, and had only found a dead end. The mines had been the same until a the little shroom dudes opened the freaking wall.

Link nods. Yes, he does know Tommy. And he's heard that theory too.

Although, there is something that has been confusing him for a bit.

"Do you know what aliens are?"

He keeps hearing people refer to the Agrii as 'aliens', and this other race. But he has no idea what the word is meant to mean. Why not just say that were another people? What was the word 'alien' meant to convey about them?

Oh no Link you precious boy.

"Oh, yeah! In this case, when people are talking about aliens, they mean somebody from another planet. Like, from space. I guess technically that would make all of us the aliens, since we're not from this planet..."

Sonic stop you're making it stupid and complicated.

"...Uh huh."

Yup, that does indeed sound stupid and complicated.

Although more because by that logic, the word seems to have lost all meaning altogether. If they're all aliens...what is even the point of using the word?

Still seems easier, to just refer to people by what they actually are.

"What are your people called?" he asks. Link doesn't know; Sonic's the only one of his race that Link has met.

It's far more normal than it probably should be but don't worry about it. Ash is used to it.

"Yeah, of course we have. But I don't have any of my rock or fire type Pokémon that could stand that level of extreme heat." Meaning there's not much Ash can do to help against a volcano.

Dustin has taken a similar approach to exploring the Warrens (leaving by himself without warning to just go wander somewhere new) and for similar reasons (profound boredom mixed with anxiety-induced restlessness). He is, however, in a very different boat when it comes to directions. Dustin doesn't forget things, which makes navigating mazes kind of trivial. He doesn't even bring anything to document his travels with; his eyes and brain are good enough for the task. This leaves his hands open for things like picking up and idly taking apart various loose debris from the hallways and floors that look interesting.

Which is what he's doing when he tries to open a door to a branching room and finds he has company already opening it from the other side.

Dustin himself is a bit of an odd customer, by human standards: Short and slight teenager, made just a little bit taller by the exoskeleton suit wrapped around his back, arms, and legs like he's being gently supported by a series of metal claws, wild dark hair that has at least been washed at this point. But that's nothing compared to Sonic the Motherfucking Hedgehog. Dustin has had a few months to get acclimated to seeing the little blue alien's portrait in the 'Dictionary,' but it's not quite the same as looking down and seeing him in the flesh. He noticeably flinches backwards before his memory kicks in and informs him that this isn't some terrifying, as-of-yet undiscovered Warrens monster ambushing him from a dark room.

"Shit," he breathes with a scowl, like this is somehow Sonic's fault. "What were you doing in there?"

Hang on Link, Sonic's blown his own mind with the realization that we're the aliens actually, and he's kind of coming to the same conclusion as Link about the whole matter.

Anyway, time to fumble over more answers!

"Oh, um, well I'm a hedgehog, but people where I'm from are more than just like one dominant species, like a lot of these other Earths seem to have. We have foxes, lizards, humans, birds, one Echidna. all kinds of people. It's actually really weird to me that so many other worlds are like, just humans, and nothing else has really evolved that far."

"...I don't now what that means or how it's relevant, but the Agrii and a couple randos on the network are sayin' we need to get into the mines for safety," which sounds insane to him, but he's rolled with stupider plans. "The volcano's supposed to blow in a few hours. I know it's early, but the sooner we get everyone to safety, the better, right?"

"Practicing my jump scares."

So he says, complete with a shithead little gremlin grin, but he'd been just as startled by Dustin appearing in the doorway and Dustin had been of him. Even so, he manages to relax and crack jokes rather than acting on instinct and spin dash this poor guy over or something. His reflexes are shit right now anyway, he hasn't been eating nearly as much as he needs to and man he is feelin' it.

A 'hedgehog'...Sonic had mentioned that earlier, hadn't he? As something he didn't want Link and Zelda to eat.

"We have Hylians. Gerudo. Rito. Gorons. Zora. Hylians and Gerudo are like humans. But we don't have weird round ears."

Which Link still found a little strange. There was just something so...odd-looking, about rounded ears.

"Huh?" Ash blinks and then fishes the communicator out of his pocket. He checks to see he seems to have missed a few important messages.

"Pikapi! Pikachu Pika pi pikachu." Pikachu says, sounding irritated.

"Sorry Pikachu, I don't always think to check this thing." He says sounding a little too sheepish for someone that missed an evacuation notice. "How come they want us to go the mines? Wouldn't the lava flow down there too?"

Hedgehogs might be delicious? But they'd probably be a lot of trouble actually eat.

"See, that sounds more like what I'm used to! Lots of different people. Humans where I'm from all have rounded little ears too, but yours look cool!"

"You seriously slept through that...?"

He's kind of impressed. Not in a like, good way? But there's some level of impressed or disbelief or something to that extent.

"Anyway. Honestly, that's kind of my concern too, but there's nothing else we can really do. Leaving town doesn't work, the train's no good, no ships to fly out of here... We're running on blind faith here, but I kinda do that on the reg and it's worked out for me so far?"

He can only shrug, man. Such is life.

“All Hylians would be weird,” Link agrees. Sure, there were areas where one group was most common, of course. They all had their preferred homes. It wasn’t just one group everywhere, like these other worlds seemed to be.

“…Pointy ears are cool?” He adds. They were just…normal, to him.

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[Open] there goes the neighborhood

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